Puppets of the Leaf
by Riotv2
Summary: Naruto visits Suna with the Hokage and discovers the art of Puppetry. Not a super/dark Naruto. Not dead yet. New chapters comming.
1. Chapter 1

Puppet of the Leaf

Puppet of the Leaf.

Disclaimer- I do not own Naruto.

AN: let me first start by saying this is not a super naruto fic. Just using puppets wont make him suddenly Kage level. And while I've read, and enjoyed, many of those, I wanted something different for mine. All puppets that Naruto builds are my own ideas. If someone wants to use any for their own story please give credit where credit is due.

Chapter 1:

The Sandiame Hokage, leader of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, walked at an even pace through the streets of his village, never breaking stride nor acknowledging the protests of the grey-haired ANBU following him.

"Hokage-Samma, please listen to reason." The voice of the ANBU was still cool and calm, almost bored, "If you must go then take an escort with you, if not one of my subordinates, then at least one of the Jounin."

Finally the old leader stopped and turned with a sigh. "Listen, I appreciate you're concern for my wellbeing, however, since the old Kazekage vanished, Suna had all but severed it's ties to all other villages, now I must go to meet with their new Kage if we are to have any hope of forming a treaty with them. Besides, I _am_ Hokage, I'm quite capable of taking care of my…"

His voice trailed off as a loud noise erupted from a nearby alley, accompanied by a fit of yelling. Sarutobi was about to continue his thoughts when they both discerned one word from all the otherwise intelligible obscenities…'demon'. As soon as the word registered with the two men they were off, the ANBU, not for the first time, surprised by the speed the old man was moving with.

The two rounded the corner in time to see two men standing over a few knocked over garbage cans, sprawled among which was a small figure with a blonde head of hair. The boy, no older then four or five, was crying, his sobs reaching them even from the front of the alley.

The first of the two men held the broken handle of a broom stick over his head, obviously intending to hit the boy with it. "Dam monster, Hokage's not here to save your demon ass now…" He brought the stick down towards the child's head, and went instantly pale when a good portion of its length clattered to the floor. The frightened man turned to look behind him in time to see a member of ANBU re sheath his katana on his back with a defining 'click'. His head snapped back to the front as footsteps could be heard coming towards him. There before him was a man he easily recognized, even without his traditional robes and large hat. "Ho…Hokage-samma…"

Ignoring the terrified man, Sarutobi knelt down and examined the boy. He had only minor injuries, and most of them, he saw wouldn't have been caused by the men. All in all, he was mostly just scared. Standing, Sarutobi came to a conclusion.

"Kakashi, take them away. Charge them with assault and lock them up I'll deal with them when I return." The two were quickly rendered unconscious and restrained.

"Hokage-sama, I still don't think it's wise to…"

"Don't worry; I'll bring an escort, alright?"

Nodding, Kakshi took the two and vanished. The old man turned back to the, now smiling, boy and helped him up. "Now then Naruto, how would you like to take a trip with me?"

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AN: Read and review, second chapter will be out shortly.


	2. Chapter 2

Puppet of the leaf

Puppet of the leaf.

Chapter 2:

Naruto couldn't believe how different this village was when compared to his home, not only in looks, but the people were what struck him the most. There was none of the cold looks or the whispers when he came near. In fact, those who saw him arrive with the Hokage, who had put on his official robes as they approached the desert village, gave him looks he couldn't quite describe. When he asked about them, the old man looked at him sadly and told him that they were looks of respect, knowing full well that the boy had never received them before.

After they had arrived the Hokage had been escorted to see the new Kazekage, telling Naruto that he could look around, so long as he didn't get lost and that he was back at this building before dark, when they would go to their rooms, since his business would take, at least, a few days. So now, naturally, Naruto had absolutely no idea where he was.

After wandering around for a while, Naruto decided to ask for directions back to the Kage's office, or at least to the nearest Ramen stand, now that he paid attention though, he discovered that there were no people around. "Ohh Come On!" he yelled out to the world his frustration.

This particular area of the village seemed to be mostly warehouses and storage, and the boy couldn't tell one block from the other. Finally though, as he rounded a corner he spotted someone entering one of the buildings. He tried to call out to them but they were gone before he could get the words out.

Naruto rushed over to the door and stepped inside. The room wasn't much of anything, just some filing cabinets and shelving. There was a desk against one wall, and another door on the far side of the office, slightly ajar, with a dim flickering light coming from within. He peeked inside cautiously to see what appeared to me several human silhouettes outlined by a few candles over a smaller work bench.

None of the figures even stirred as he stepped into the room. Nervously Naruto cleared his throat to gain their attention. When no one turned, naruto approached but could still not make out anything of great detail.

"E…excuse me…" Naruto reached out a hand to tap on the persons arm almost half expecting the man to backhand him for being where he clearly wasn't supposed to be.

As Naruto's hand brushed the figure it suddenly collapsed to the floor in a great tumble of limp limbs, and clattering of noise. He let out a loud yelp as he jumped backward.

With the figure no longer blocking the light from the candles, its features were now fully revealed to him. What he had taken for a living, if immobile, person was actually a wooden replica of an adult human. The others around him were all similar to the one he had knocked down. In the light he could now see that they were actually suspended from a series of ropes.

Naruto was staring at them all, trying to figure out what they could be for, when he received his second life threatening shock of the day as a hand clamped down on his shoulder.

"What are you doing here, Boy?!" Naruto was forcibly turned around as the person he had followed into the building came into view. He was slightly confused to find that the person was actually a woman perhaps only slightly older than the Hokage.

"Well, answer me!"

"I…I'm…sorry…I was lost…and I saw you come in here…" the boy quickly recounted his story for the old lady, however she took his words in complete silence, giving him no indication of how much trouble he was in. Because of this Naruto dared to hope that she might actually help him find his way back.

After a few more minutes the woman took him roughly by the hand and began dragging him towards the door. "Come on." Her voice was tight and crisp, showing obvious annoyance at the boy's appearance.

With another look back at the wooden figures Naruto's curiosity was piqued. "H…Hey wait what are those things?"

The woman was momentarily thrown off by the question. She first looked at him then in the direction he indicated. "Those are battle puppets for the Puppet Corps."

Eyes wide with wonder Naruto continued to stare at them. "Battle puppets? What are they for?"

The woman was quickly realizing how dense and naïve the kid was. "Our ninja use them as tools to fight with. Those who specialize in this type of combat are call the Puppet Corps. This is one of the old workshops used by some of the members."

She could see more questions building up in his mind so she decided to give him a small demonstration of the technique to satisfy his curiosity and therefore get rid of him faster. Had she known this boy a little better, she would have realized that such an act would ultimately have the opposite result.

The boy sat on a stool as she connected blue glowing strings from he fingers onto the puppet he knocked over. With a twitch of her fingers the puppet leapt to its feet and began to walk in circles around the boy.

Naruto was entranced by the technique. He had always wanted to be a ninja and had been pestering Sarutobi to let him enter the Leaf's Ninja Academy. He suspected that the man would eventually give in, like he always did, however he would have to wait since the age limit at the academy was seven. He still had two more years to go, but that didn't mean that he couldn't get started early on his own.

"Hey, can I learn to do that?" The boy was on the edge of his seat. The puppet had stopped moving and the woman just stared at him. As if judging weather or not he could actually learn the Puppet techniques. Finally she shook her head.

"Sorry Boy, this is much too advanced for someone your age." The woman thought about that for a second. It wasn't as If she herself hadn't trained a child of about Narutos age. That boy had gone on to be one of the best in the field, until he vanished along with the secrets of various techniques that he had created.

Besides this boy was from a Village she wasn't particularly fond of. Why should she help one of their own become someone who might one day pose a threat to Suna?

"I'm not a kid…I can already call on my chakra…you just need to show me how to use to make the puppet move, I'll figure out the rest. PLEASE!!"

The old woman was suddenly struck with a memory long buried in her subconscious. Her eyes widened as the image of another boy overlapped that of the blond before her. This boy had red hair, and even as she registered who it was she could hear his voice in her mind, _'PLEASE, Ba-chan, Just give me a hint, and I'll figure the rest out on my own.'_

As the image of her grandson faded from her view, she again focused on the blonde in front of her.

"What's your name Gaki?"

"Uzumaki Naruto, future Hokage of Konoha!"

As he said this he hopped off the stool and gave her a proud smile.

'_What am I doing?'_

"How long are you going to be in Suna?"

"At least a few days, while the Third is talking to the Kazekage."

The woman let out a long sigh. _'I know I'm going to regret this.' _

"Ok here's the deal, I'll show you how to make the Chakra Strings, _ONCE. _ Then you have until tomorrow at this time to show me you can make at least one string on your index finger. If you can't, deals off. Also you can't tell ANYONE about this. Got it?"

Naruto began to furiously nod his head, his smile getting even bigger.

"Ok, if you can get it down then I'll show you the basics, after that your on your own. First you need to channel chakra to the tip of the finger you want to create the string from…"

The woman explained how to create the chakra strings, as well as how they were supposed to be applied followed by another demonstration, this time on a Kuni. After watching him focus chakra to his finger once or twice she sent him on his way back to town, wondering if she'd ever see him again.

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AN: As always please R&R. Chapter three up soon.


	3. Chapter 3

Puppets of the Leaf

AN: Wow thanks everyone. It's only been a few hours since i posted the first two chapters and it's got over two hundred hits. I know that last two chapters were short but this one is longer. Keep the reviews comming, they help.

Chapter 3

Naruto was, to put it lightly, beat. After finding his way back to their rooms, well after dark, he discovered that the Hokage was actually still in his meeting with the Kazekage. Naruto was relieved that he wasn't going to get into trouble for being late.

The boy immediately began to practice the technique he had been shown, determined to get it down. While he was pretty clueless about a lot of things, when it came to training, Naruto had the kind of determination most people only dreamed of. He had learned to channel his Chakra by listening in as a Leaf ninja taught his son in their yard. Naruto was hiding in a tree, and was chased off when he was caught, but had gone back and picked up enough to be able to figure it out. This was actually how he received most of his training, up to this point, and it was a little strange to have the old woman explaining it directly to him. He wondered briefly if that was what it would be like when he entered into the academy.

Naruto had worked tirelessly until the Hokage returned, then snuck out after the man had fallen asleep and practiced some more on the roof. His progress was slow, extremely slow, as he couldn't get the string to stretch more than an inch from his fingertip. As the night wore on and dawn was creeping over the horizon he made his way back inside until the Hokage left him alone again. The boy desperately wanted to ask him for help but remembered the warning she gave him about telling anyone.

He practiced again until about midday and headed back towards the warehouse. This time he had no trouble finding it since the lady was standing outside. As he approached she had him show her his progress. Naruto raised his hands, right forefinger extended, to begin focusing his chakra, when she held out a small piece of wood towards him. Naruto, confused by the gesture, took it then looked at her questioningly.

"Attach a string to it…if you can."

She hadn't mentioned this to him yesterday, and he hadn't even thought to attempt to connect the small string he was able to make to anything. Hesitantly, Naruto again raised his hands into the proper position, and focused the chakra into his finger, which, alone, had taken him hours to be able to do, and began to form it into the string. The finger was already touching the block of wood, and he felt the string, almost automatically, attach itself. All at once he could feel the block, through the chakra, as if it were a part of him.

The loudmouthed boy grinned at the old woman and dropped the wood, expecting it to hang off of the inches long string he had been capable of that morning. However the wood kept on falling until it sat suspended nearly two feet from his open hand. His eyes grew wide and his mouth hung open in complete shock.

The woman also was surprised by the boy's feat. In truth she'd expected the boy to give up after not being able to produce any results. Even if he had shown up she certainly hadn't expected him to make a string that long after only being showed it once. However she had made a deal with him and the Ninja of Suna are taught to honor their word.

She nodded her head and turned to go into the building, as the boy tried, experimentally flexing his finger as she had done during the demonstration the day before, causing the block to dance wildly through the air. She instantly knew that he was using too much chakra, much more than a boy of his age should have been capable of. _'Just who is this kid?' _

"Alright Gaki, lets go. We have a lot of work to do."

At the sound of her voice, Naruto lost his mental grip on the chakra, letting the string dissolve and sending the wood flying across the street. The kid laughed sheepishly while scratching the back of his head and followed her inside

For the rest of the week, she gave him a crash course in the art of puppetry. She never went over things a second time, though she did allow him to ask questions during the lectures, and gave him supplemental reading materials that she let him keep. Each morning he left the room he shared with the Hokage, and met her at the warehouse, she would give him some new aspect to work on then he would leave before dusk, have dinner and go back to the room, often staying up most of the night practicing or reading the scrolls she gave him. By mid week he could sustain strings on all of his fingers and connect them to an object.

At the end of the week the Third announced that they would be returning to Konoha the following day and that if there was something that Naruto wanted to do, he should do it that day.

Naruto rushed out the door to meet his new teacher and told her it would be his last day. Instead of reacting, she handed him the small marionette he had been practicing with, and had him get to work.

Naruto sat on the ground making the small puppet move across the floor. He found it relatively easy to make it sail from one side of the room to the other and perform wild sloppy maneuvers, but was struggling with more simple detailed ones. The lady said that the precision and finesse required would come with time. As he practiced, she sat at the desk writing a series of scrolls. When he asked about them she said she was just catching up on some work.

Finally their time ended and Naruto said goodbye and thanked her before heading back to his room.

When he did get back it struck him as odd that the Hokage had never asked him what he was doing during their visit, but decided not to press his luck by mentioning it first.

The following morning, Naruto was anxious. He didn't want to leave, and he sure didn't want to go back to the whispers and hateful stares he received in the Leaf. At the very least he wanted to go find the old lady and thank her again. However, he realized, he didn't even know her name, having been too excited by what he was learning to ask.

As the two made their way towards the village gates, Naruto turned his thoughts to the problem of acquiring the necessary tools he would need to continue learning how to use puppets. As far as he knew, they didn't make puppets in Konoha.

They exited the village and began the long walk back towards their home.

When they were at least a mile outside the village, Naruto was about to confess everything to Sarutobi in the hopes that he could help him. As he looked up however he noticed a figure sitting on the sand before them. He instantly recognized her.

"B..Ba-chan?" The Hokage quirked an eyebrow at the familiarity between them; however he didn't seem all that surprised.

The woman ignored the boy and approached the Third directly.

"Hokage-samma…"

The old man nodded.

"I'm afraid you have me at a disadvantage, madam."

"I am Elder Chyo."

The old man nodded again, the glint of recognition in his eyes.

"Ahh yes, it is an honor to at last meet Suna's finest Puppet Master."

Naruto snapped his head back around towards his teacher. He hadn't realized that she was that famous.

"Tell me to what do I owe the honor?"

For the briefest of moments her eyes shifted to the boy standing next to them.

"Please, don't trifle with me Sarutobi. We're both far too old and not getting any younger. I know you are aware of what your young charge was up too during this past week."

Naruto's shocked gaze shifted between the two. _'He knew!!' _

The old man giggled. "Of course. I meant to thank you for all you have done for him. However, I was inquiring as to your reason for this little visit."

The woman reached into the bag strung at her hip and produced three large scrolls, along with and envelope and a wrapped package.

"These are for the Gaki. They contain some additional training instructions for him if he wants to continue to become a puppet user. The letter has a list of which to give him and when." She handed them to the old man and he placed them reverently into his pack.

"Again I thank you. I was curious just what he was learning here in Suna, and I'm glad that it was something that will be unique in our village."

The old woman, Chyo, narrowed her eyes at the man. "Why is that exactly, so you can exploit what he learns, and gain the art of puppetry for the Leaf?"

The Hokage was taken aback at her outburst. "Not at all. Naruto has always liked to stand out, and be noticed. Being the only one in the village to use a certain type of technique will accomplish that and make him happy." The old man lowered his voice so that only she would hear. "He has become something of a grandson to me, since he was orphaned at birth."

Her look softend as she was once again reminded of the similarities of the boy and her own estranged grandson. "I can understand that better than you know, Hokage-samma."

Before making her way back to the village, she tossed the package to Naruto, who watched after her until she was out of sight. Not once had she said a single word to him. He unwrapped the light fabric that covered the object in his hands to reveal the marionette he had been using to practice with. Pinned to its chest was a note that he was required to practice with it the **entire **trip.

Along the way the Hokage had confessed that the negotiations had been concluded within the first two days, however he wanted to allow Naruto the opportunity to continue his lessons for a while longer, after watching him train so hard that first night.

Upon their return the Hokage had presented the first in the long series of scrolls that had been sealed into the three Chyo Ba-sensei, as Naruto had begun calling her, had given to them. It contained much the same information he had already been taught, only in greater detail, as well as exercises intended to improve the control of the Marionette.

Naruto began training with the same single-minded intensity he had on the first night. When the time came to enter the Ninja Academy, Naruto had a much better understanding of what exactly it was that a puppet user did in battle. He had also increased the distance he could stretch his strings to about fifteen feet in all directions. As for his control of the Marionette, he could now control it almost flawlessly with both hands, and was now working on just one hand, though this was often just as clumsy as when he had first begun. All in all he had mastered around half the lessons in the first of the three scrolls. Though he was impatient, the Third had told him that he was instructed to give him the next lesson only after he had proven that he had mastered, and had sufficient practice with the previous ones. The Hokage had also said that Naruto wouldn't be able to start on the second of the three scrolls until he graduated from the academy, as per Elder Chyo's instructions.

Despite those conditions, Naruto was so focused on his lessons in puppetry that his grades in the academy had suffered, that combined with the fact that the instructors were not interested in teaching him anything left him as the 'dead last' for all three of the academy years.

By the start of his final year at the academy, Naruto had long finished the first scroll, and had managed to convince the hokage to give him the first lessons in the second, which turned out to be instructions on building his own puppets, as well as a couple of 'blank' puppets that had been sealed along with the scrolls. Naruto had immediately begun to practice using one of the new puppets, however, it was slow going, since the new ones were much larger, a little taller than him, and much more complicated in their mechanics, and it took him some time to get used to.

His first problem was that he didn't want to have to carry one around on his back, let alone two of them. He asked the Hokage about the three scrolls that had the items sealed into them. The Hokage agreed to make a storage scroll for Naruto, and would show him how to make them himself after he began the third scroll, which would likely have the method in it anyway.

On the day of his final exam, Naruto found himself sitting alone on a swing outside of the school, watching all of those who had passed getting their congratulations from their parents.

Shortly Naruto was joined by one of his teachers, who asked Naruto to go with him so they could talk. They sat on a roof overlooking the village and Mizuki told him that if he could steal a certain scroll and learn one Jutsu from it, it would count as extra credit, so Iruka would let him pass.

The boy leapt at the chance, and that night made his way towards the Hokage Tower. Inside he managed to avoid the guards, and found the giant scroll in a room behind the Hokage's personal chamber. As he picked it up he heard a shuffling of cloth behind him.

"Naruto? What are you doing?"

Naruto turned to face the ageing Hokage, holding not only the Forbidden Scroll of sealing, but also a smaller purple scroll, that he had taken off of a holder on his left thigh.

"Ehh… Sorry Old Man, but I need this." Before the Hokage could stop him, Naruto opened the small scroll and bit his thumb, after swiping the blood across the seal on the paper, the scene was filled with an explosion of smoke.

Naruto landed on the ground hard, panting and trying to catch his breath. He hadn't anticipated that much difficulty in learning a new Jutsu, but after hours of work he had finally managed to master the first technique.

He was so tired that he barely noticed the man standing behind him. After the person cleared his throat, Naruto turned to see his teacher Iruka.

"Aww man you found me already, I only had time to learn one technique, but now you have to let me pass right?"

Iruka was taken aback. "What? Is that why you took the scroll? Where did you get an idea like that?"

Quickly Naruto explained his conversation with Mizuki. Iruka went from confused to pissed almost instantly. Before he could say anything else a large shuriken came flying out of the trees towards them and impacted into Iruka's back, when the teacher pushed Naruto out of the way.

Events after that initial attack passed too quickly for Naruto to easily recall them. He now stood before his injured teacher, the only thing between Iruka and his potential killer. The boy tossed the large scroll to the fallen teacher, and pulled out a small white scroll from his thigh. Naruto threw it open biting his thumb and swiping it across the surface. In an explosion of smoke, Naruto has summoned one of his two puppets. It was still the 'blank', non detailed one it had been when he first got it, except that he had replaced it's hands with Kunai that were slightly longer than normal.

"Oh please," Mizuke scoffed "do you really expect to beat me with that doll of yours?"

"Bastard…I'll kick your ass!!" Naruto threw both hands forward and the puppet lunged towards the Chunin instructor.

Iruka was speechless. He had seen the boy playing with a small wooden puppet in class before, and knew from the Hokage that he was training to be a Puppeteer, but he had no idea that Naruto could use one the size of a fully grown man. Let alone with the degree of skill that he was witnessing before him as Mizuki was being chased around the clearing by the strange puppet. Iruka hoped it would keep the traitor busy until help arrived.

Naruto, meanwhile, was getting more and more frustrated. He had never had to use his puppets on a moving target like this before, and it showed. The teacher was dodging everything the boy threw at him with ease. Worse he seemed to be enjoying it.

Finally the Chunin seemed to tire of the game and stopped in the center of the clearing. As the puppet approached he leapt over it and stomped it into the ground crushing its head beneath his foot. He seared at Naruto as he kicked the remains away into the woods.

"Is that all you can offer me Demon?"

The comment enraged the boy to no end. The revalation had come as a shock, but was eased by the declaration that Iruka hadn't seen him as the demon fox contained within him.

The thought of his sensei, who was more like an older brother, and the injury he took for the boy pissed Naruto off even further.

"No," Naruto brought his finger up in a cross before him as he replied darkly, "I've got something else to show you…KAGEBUNSHIN NO JUTSU!!"


	4. Chapter 4

Puppets of the Leaf

AN: Wow now over 300 Hits and still counting. Thanks to CKMo for teh enthusiastic reviews. As of this moment i have Chapter five already done however I'll olny release it after i finish Chapter 6, which is about 2/3 of the way done so expect another update within the next day or two. Sorry that this chapter wasn't as long as the last ne bu the next two will be much longer.

Chapter 4

This had been the happiest day of his young life. Even more so than his discovery of the puppet technique, though he thought it to be a close second. Mizuke had been so stunned by the boys use of the technique learned from the Forbidden scroll, he hadn't been able to defend himself from the onslaught of literally hundreds of clones. Shortly after the Traitors defeat, Iruka had presented Naruto with his own headband and pronounced him as a graduate of the Ninja Academy.

After several ANBU arrived in the clearing, Iruka had explained to them the boy had been innocent and they took Mizuki into custody to stand trial, while Iruka helped Naruto gather the pieces of his puppet, and reseal them into the scroll before going to the Hokage's office to return the scroll. When they walked into the room Naruto burst out laughing at the two bloody pieces of tissue sticking out of his nose. The Hokage waved off the Chunin's questions, and listened to their report on the incident.

"Well, Naruto, it seems that Konoha owes you a debt. There will of course be a reward for exposing, and then capturing the traitor." The Hokage reached blow his desk to retrieve a small pile containing several scrolls. "These are the scrolls you were to get after graduating. And these," she indicated the two on top. "were supposed to be given after you had engaged an enemy in a life or death battle for the first time with your puppets…assuming you survived of course."

The boy stared at the scrolls for a long time with bright eyes and a wide grin. He jumped from his seat, grabbed the scrolls from the desk, and was out the door before either of the adults could stop him. "THANKSOLDMAN,BYEIRUKA,YOUOWEMERAMENLATER,SEEYA!"

After deciphering what he had said the Hokage laughed, and Iruka mourned the future loss of this months pay to the boy's appetite.

"Now Iruka, about the team placements…"

Naruto sat on his bed, scrolls and the parts of his puppet were scattered throughout his room as he read and reread the scroll in his hands. This new set contained detailed accounts of the kinds of weapons that could be built into his puppet, and since he had to repair it anyway, he was going to completely redesign it. Naruto had determined that he would build his puppets to suit different situations. This he would use for combat. The other one would be better used as a distraction, as the Hokage had found out the previous night, to spectacular effect.

_Flashback;_

"_Naruto? What are you doing?"_

_Naruto turned to face the ageing Hokage, holding not only the Forbidden Scroll of sealing, but also a smaller purple scroll, that he had taken off of a holder on his left thigh._

"_Ehh… Sorry Old Man, but I need this." Before the Hokage could stop him, Naruto opened the small scroll and bit his thumb, after swiping the blood across the seal on the paper, the scene was filled with an explosion of smoke._

_The Hokage watched, bewildered as the boy he considered his own grandson, appeared to be ready to attack him with one of his puppets. Once the smoke cleared however his reaction was considerably different. _

_The Third Hokage, almost swallowed his pipe as he was sent flying backwards, a large amount of blood spraying from his nose. _

_Naruto for his part took a moment to laugh and mentally cheer. His first puppet's design had met with resounding success. Between him and the downed old man stood the figure of a blonde teenage girl, wearing nothing but the most revealing underwear he could get his hands on. He resealed the puppet as he leapt out of the window with the scroll, not wanting to draw any more attention to himself than he already had. _

_End Flashback;_

Naruto chucked to himself at the memory. It had caused him no end of trouble to aquire the materials needed to create him Kunoichi puppet. Even more than that, to find a suitable model to base it on. He had wandered around town for hours looking at various women. Normally Naruto would condemn someone doing this, however he consoled himself with the knowledge that he wasn't doing it for enjoyment, and only followed other Kunoichi. Finally he had found his model in the form of a Jounin with dark hair and red eyes. He studied her from every possible vantage point, committing her to his memory, until she caught him that is. He still had a slight bump on his head for that.

He then decided to change the puppets head somewhat. The last thing he wanted to think of is what she would do to him if she found out he had a half naked puppet of her at his disposal.

It didn't have any traps or weapons on it, mainly because the first scrolls only covered the cosmetic aspects of creating a puppet. Now though with the additional scrolls he was getting some very good ideas. He had asked the Hokage to place an order for some special blades to be made at a local weapons store. The old man had done so, gladly, only to inform him that in the future he could do so himself since the owner apparently didn't hate him and was intrigued by the prospect of the puppets.

Having picked them up from the shop on his way home, and placing another few orders for other parts with the reward money, he now sat fixing the blades to the puppets wrists in place of the kuni that had been there during his fight with Mizuke.

He had been working on restoring the puppet for most of the night when at last he came to the head. After examining the spot where Mizuke had stomped it into the ground he had determined that much of the face couldn't be repaired. However since he didn't have another head for the wooden figure, Naruto just decided to cover the gaping hole in its jaw with a black cloth he had picked up until he could come up with something else.

After he fixed it into place along with the dark colored, ragged hair that he had given it, he found that he rather liked the look of it. Satisfied, Naruto sat the puppet in the corner of the room and drifted off to sleep, his Leaf Headband clutched in his hand.

The next day found the blonde sitting in the classroom of the ninja academy, perhaps, he realized, for the last time. Iruka had come in, and read off the team assignments. Naruto was mildly disappointed that he had to put up with the class showoff, and the showoffs number one fan. For a while Naruto had actually had a crush on the pink haired girl. However time, and having his attention focused almost exclusively on his puppetry, had changed that. Especially after she had made the comment about his 'playing' with a 'doll' during class one day.

After they had waited for a few hours after the rest of the teams had gone off with their Jounin instructors, the leader of Team 7 finally arrived. His entry heralded by an eraser falling on his head.

­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­

Once the three had gathered on the roof of the academy, their new Sensei, Hatake Kakashi, began by asking for some information about them, to help their team get to know each other. Sakura had pointed out that he should go first, however all of the information he gave them was so cryptic, all they had learned about him was his name.

Sakura followed him by going into a fit of squealing and giggle every time she looked at their raven-haired teammate. The only thing she had made clear was her great dislike for Naruto.

Uchiha Sasuke went next by saying that he was basically an emo bastard who wanted to kill someone or something like that, at least that was all Naruto had gathered as he tinkered with the knee joint on a detached wooden leg.

When it was finally his turn, Naruto proclaimed, loudly, that he enjoyed training, ramen, working on his puppets, ramen, and…well…ramen. He didn't like the three minutes it took to make instant ramen, and people who called his puppets, dolls. His dreams were to become the greatest Puppeteer in the world and would be the greatest Hokage the village had ever seen.

It had come as a considerable shock to Kakashi that the boy wanted to become a Puppet user. Even he had only ever encountered a couple in is lifetime, and one had been when he was taking the Chunnin exams. He knew that those who practiced the art were becoming rarer and rarer, even in Suna where the style had originated. He made a mental note to inquire about it with the Hokage. Kakashi left shortly after, telling the three to meet him the next morning at the training grounds, and to skip breakfast if they didn't want to throw it all up.

Immediately after they were dismissed Sasuke went off to train with Sakura nipping at his heels. Naruto had run off in the direction of his apartment to continue restoring his damaged puppet.

He was running through the training grounds, taking a shortcut, when he heard the sharp sounds of metal impacting into solid objects. Veering off his intended course, Naruto came upon what must have been a team practice. He could see two similarly dressed ninja, both in an ugly green bodysuit, practicing Taijutsu. Both were utterly scary in their skill, while a short distance away, a girl in a pink shirt leapt into the air twirling a long scroll around herself. Naruto watched transfixed as hundreds of weapons suddenly streamed out of the scroll and flew strait at their third teammate, who miraculously managed to dodge all of them.

A tight smile spread across his face as Naruto slipped away from the strange team. Instead of continuing towards his home, the blonde now made his way towards the weapons shop. He had just figured out how he could fix his puppets head.

The man who ran he weapons shop was getting to like his new best customer the more he saw him. The boy had come in asking all manner of questions about throwing weapons. The man had shown him everything from Kunai, to oversized Shuriken. Finally the boy had settled on an impressive number of a surprising type of weapon.

The man even went as far as to help him with the finer details of getting the weapon to work like the kid wanted. After testing it out in the target range behind the mans shop, both thought that the results were nothing less than spectacular. The man invited Naruto to stay and practice with it as long as he wanted, but Naruto had other things on his mind right then. _cough ramen cough_

As an afterthought, the man asked the boy to wait for a moment and went into the store room. He came back a moment later with a rolled up black cloth. At the shop owners direction Naruto Stood his puppet upright and he threw the cloth around its shoulders. It's wooden frame was enveloped in thick black cloak, the man made a few adjustments, pinning the front closed so would completely cover the body when it wasn't in motion and raising a low hood over it's head of shaggy brown hair.

The effect left Naruto speechless. With the puppets newly painted red eyes, and the mask covering the lower part of its reconstructed face, it looked as though there were a living person under the overlong cloak.

The shop owner steadfastidly refused payment for the cloak, saying that it was his contribution to Konohas newest ninja art. One he hoped would see more practitioners in the future.

Naruto made a mental note to recommend the shop to as many people as he could to help his business, and left to see to some other 'business' that was making itself known with a low grumble.

Naruto was looking forward to his first team session, where he would; finally, show what his 'dolls' could do.

…………………………………………………………………………………….

AN:

Just some notes on Naruto's puppets.

Practice Marionette- a small wooden puppet. Picture an artist's sketch model.

Sexy Kunoichi- A female puppet, built to mimic human movement and appearance. Its wooden frame is covered with a material designed to mimic human flesh, which is normally used to test the effectiveness of various weapons and Jutsu. (Similar to ballistics gel) Replacement for Naruto's Sexy Jutsu, while not naked, it is wearing some revealing lingerie, which Naruto refuses to tell the source of. This puppet is NOT anatomically correct. (No, it is not a sex doll.) Used mainly as a distraction, and as a pervert trap.


	5. Chapter 5

Puppets of the Leaf

AN: This story just keep gaining in popularity. Thans to everyone for the support. I'd like to take a minute to answer a few reviews.

david9999: thanks i'm glad you like my story, as for you're question, The thing is that Naruto and Sasuke alrady were best friends in the original storyline. That hasn't changed. However because naruto is his best friend, that means that Sasuke must kill him to obtain power, as he tried to do at the vally of the end. I'm still a little sunsure about what to do about that, so we'll just have to see what happens.

bailkatanas: Thanks, it kinda struck me as odd that Chiyo never came up as a teacher before in other fics like this. I seemed kinda obvious, even if it was only for the basics.

The Three Stoogies: Don't get me wrong, i enjoy reading the SUPER/DARK Naruto fics as much as the next guy. I just wanted to see a story where he was struggleing with his power like everyone else.

Chapter 5:

The following morning, Naruto was anxiously awaiting the arrival of his teacher, who was late…again. When the Jounin arrived, he explained the rules for the Bell Test, and set a timer on one of three posts in the center of the area. At his signal the three leapt into the trees.

Naruto had learned his lesson about attacking outright with his puppets after the damage Mizuke had done. This time he would try to be a little more subtle.

Kakashi was slightly impressed at how well the three were hiding themselves, though he could still pick them out by their chakra signatures, but this was to be expected of rookies. The only one he could see visually at all was Naruto. If they passed, and that was unlikely, He would have to talk to the boy about the dangers of wearing orange while trying to be stealthy.

He was about to go back to his book when a tall figure dropped down from the trees behind him. He turned to face the newcomer.

"I'm sorry, we're conducting a training exercise. You'll need to leave the area."

'_Well it looks like Naruto's first. This is going to be interesting.'_

When the figure remained silent, Kakashi addressed it again. "Not the talkative type huh? I'm afraid you'll have to identify yourself."

The figure slowly made its way towards him, seemingly gliding along the ground. When it was within a few feet, it lunged forward, one arm snakeing it's way out of the cloak and taking a swipe at Kakashi's head. The Jounin casually raised his hand and caught the blow on the metal plate of his glove.

He expected the puppet to back off and attack again, however the cloak flared around him as it's three other bladed limbs flew at him from different directions. Stepping to the side Kakshi dodged two of the attacks and blocked the third with a Kuni. This went on for another minute as he saw that the attacks came in a predictable pattern.

"Not bad Naruto, but…" at that moment the Jounin leapt up, away from the puppet and sent his kuni strait into the branch, only a hairs breath from Narutos head.

The boy took a steadying breath and dropped down from the tree he was hiding in.

With a wave of his hands the puppet came back to crouch down next to him.

"Heh, if you know where I am there's no use hiding now." The confidence he tried to project through his voice, did nothing to hide the blondes nervousness from Kakashi.

The Jounin, still reading his book, looked completely relaxed as Naruto thrust his hands out sending the blades on his Puppets limbs, through the man's chest, only to puff away into a log.

The boy froze in terror as a voice from behind him uttered the words that would haunt his dreams for the rest of his life. "Hidden Village of Konoha's Secret Master Taijutsu Art:"

Naruto looked over his shoulder at the crouching Jounin, His hands in the Tiger Seal.

"A THOUSDAND YEARS OF PAIN!!" Naruto was sent flying through the air as the jounin thrust his hands forward into his rear end. They boy fell into a nearby lake. The puppet fell lifelessly to the ground with it's blades still firmly stuck in the log.

Naruto climed out of the water looking very much like the drownd rat he felt like at that moment. "You should focus on other things besides using that puppet of yours. Without it you'll die." The smug jounin turned to walk away, however stopped in his tracks when several other Naruto's all leapt out of the water after him. He stared up at them in mild surprise. The file he read had only mentioned the child skill with puppets, there had been no mention that he could use the Kage Bunshin technique.

His musings were broken when something grabbed onto him from behind. "Heh, Puppetry isn't my only skill, Sensei." The silver haired Jounin, smiled beneath his mask. As the clones all came down on him, he quickly replaced himself with the original that was also coming at him. What resulted was pure and simple chaos. With such a simple move, he had caused the clones to turn on eachother. When the boy, finally dispelled the technique, he noticed a silver object on the floor next to him.

"Damn Sensei." Naruto thought to himself as he hung there by his foot. He had bent to pick up the bell that must have fallen free in the struggle, only to find himself the victim of snare trap.

He reaching into his Kuni pouch and used one of the throwing knives to cut himself free. He managed to get his feet under himself and land on his feet, and once again was lifted upwards as the second snare went off.

"Damn EVIL Sensei!" He looked down at the ground to see not only the Kuni he had used the first time, but also all of the others that where in his pouch. Naruto cursed himself and looked over to his puppet, which was still stuck in the log and would be useless to him. Shrugging to himself Naruto cast out a Chakra string at the pile of Kuni and pulled one up to his hand. Once he was free, again, He set about the task of freeing his puppet, a task that would be impossible until he could get some tools. For the time being, he sealed the puppet back up and ttried to think about what to do next. His stomach chose that moment to make itself known, and it was then he remembered the two lunches that Kakashi had brought for those who got the bells. As his stomach rumbled again a thought crossed his mind, and he grinned at the idea.

'Look underneath the underneith' he had said when Naruto was caught. Naruto quickly found the lunches and sat down with them behind the three stumps. He was about to take his first bite when, "What exactly do you think you're doing?"

Naruto was really beginning to hate ropes. Now he was tied to a stump and Kakashi was in the process of failing them all. Apparently neither of the others had any more luck than he did in getting a bell. That made him feel slightly better, knowing the Teme and the Harpy had failed as well, but not much. _'What would Chyo-Ba sensei think of me now?'_

"Out of the kindness of my heart I'll give you three one more chance. You'll have just one hour to get the bells from me. First you two eat those lunches, but under NO circumstances are you to give any to Naruto. It's his punishment for trying to eat them both himself. I'll be back in twenty minutes then we'll see if you can work together long enough to pass."

Kakashi disappeared in a puff of smoke. The two picked up there lunches and began to eat. Naruto was determined to succeed this time. He kept his eyes closed to he wouldn't have to watch them eat. The thought of food was too much for his stomach and it erupted in a loud grumble that was heard by the other two as well.

"Here, eat this quickly." Naruto's eyes opened in a flash, and saw that Sasuke was holding out his food to him.

"Wh…what…"

"If you don't eat you'll be no good to us."

Sakura caught on to his line of thinking and saw his point. "Here have some of mine too if we share it all then we'll all get more to eat.

"Sakura…thanks. Um…I can't while I'm tied like this. You'll have to feed me."

A vein popped out of her forehead as she picked up a mouthful on her chopsticks.

Just as she got it to his mouth, an explosion erupted before them. Kakashi loomed out of the smoke.

"YOU! ALL THREE OF YOU…pass."


	6. Chapter 6

Puppets of the Leaf

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 6:

With Team 7 officially active and able to take missions, Naruto expected to be going on body guard missions, or to be stalking a group of bandits, hell he'd even settle for patrolling a border, anything but this. They were walking back towards the Academy's briefing room, Naruto nursing various cuts and scratches that he had received from the cat that now rested in Sakura's arms.

While chasing the cat Kakashi had actually forbid Naruto from using either of his puppets, saying that a half naked kunoichi wouldn't affect a cat, and they couldn't kill the cat, so the handless Blade, as Naruto had named it, was also out. Naruto had a hell of a time trying to catch the agile feline, and when he finally did, he was ready to kill it anyway after it scratched him up. Though admittedly, Naruto couldn't blame it after seeing what the Fire Lords wife did to it.

However after seeing it jump and run around all day Naruto had gotten another Idea for a puppet. Once the team was dismissed for the day, he made a beeline for his apartment, then to the weapons shop. Finally Naruto came to his last destination, a clothing shop that specialized in furs.

Several bundles in hand, he returned to his home, and spent the rest of the night constructing his newest creation. It was slow going for him, this being the first time he was building one from scratch.

By the next morning, after Kakashi had finally shown up, they once again made their way to the Briefing room of the Academy.

"Let's see, Team 7…" The Chunin, working beside the Hokage was thumbing through the teams file and the mission requests. "…We have several D ranks available: grocery shopping, yard work, fence mending, finding the Fire Lords cat…"

"We'll take it!" All eyes suddenly turned to a grinning Naruto. Kakashi was mildly surprised at the boy's reaction, however by the way he fingered the new orange scroll that hung horizontally beneath the other two on his thigh, the Jounin suddenly feared for the animal's life.

"Are you sure?" the Chunin continued, "I have it here that you did that same thing yesterday as well."

"Ohh yes. I want that one." Naruto's grin turned positively feral, and the Hokage could have sworn that he felt a little killing intent in that grin.

Kakashi had to admit, Naruto's new puppet was pretty brilliant. He watched with an amused expression under his mask as the cat with the bow on its ear was chased closely by a small orange fox. If he hadn't seen Naruto unseal it with his own eyes, he could have almost mistaken it for the real thing.

Naruto was standing in the middle of a clearing as he directed the fox's movements, Sakura, who was standing near Kakashi and Sasuke, had at first yelled at him for using animal fur to make it, until the boy explained that it wasn't real fur. Sasuke just smirked.

The cat suddenly veered out of the clearing and into an old log, too small for them to follow. Naruto sent the fox in after it without hesitation.

"Nice going Naruto-Baka." The pink haired girl stomped up to him. "What are you going to do now; you can't see what's going on inside it."

The boy ignored he comments as he reached into his tan hip pouch and pulled out a small rectangular box. The others gathered around him as its surface came to life with a heavily blurred, dark image. "I put micro cameras in its eyes." He depressed a small button on its side and the image cleared up as it took on a greenish tone. On the small screen, before them they could clearly see the cat hissing and swiping at the puppet. Over their earpieces, they could also hear the commotion the cat was producing. "And microphones in its ears."

Before, Kakashi was impressed, now however, he was astounded, what the boy had done was to create the perfect tool for scouting and information gathering. Not for the first time since meeting the blonde, he had to question the difficulty of the graduation exam the academy administered, either that or the morals of the instructors.

He thought the later.

"So how are you going to get it out now?"

The boy grinned and twitched two fingers. On the screen, the bottom of the view was slightly blocked as the fox's mouth opened. A second later the cat jerked back and nipped at its side, before falling still. The fox approached the limp form of the cat, and seemed to take it in its mouth.

Moments later the cat was dragged out of the hollow log. Sticking out of its side was a long thin needle. Naruto was suddenly hit over the head by a screaming Sakura.

"What the hell did you do?!" Her rants and insults continued until Kakashi interrupted her.

"Sakura, stop yelling at Naruto. The cat's fine, the Senbon needle was dipped in a paralyzing agent."

He had pulled the needle from the side of the cat and a watery yellow liquid dripped from it. He looked at the fox again which was also limp where it had exited the log.

He congratulated Naruto on his puppet, and they returned to the Academy.

Needless to say the Fire Lords wife was furious when she was handed a limp cat. However after being assured that the cat would be fine in a few hours she left in a huff, and the Hokage asked to see the puppet that had captured the feline. Naruto unsealed it and caused it to leap onto the table. The old man chuckled as he pet its head. The movement was highly artificial, but based on appearance, it looked very lifelike. He recommended that Naruto practice a lot with it, to make it move in natural way, and assigned them another mission. This time picking up groceries.

Naruto was practicing with his puppets, trying to control both Blade and Kyu, his new fox-like creation, at the same time. The results were less than ideal. He still lacked the control, and fines that Chyo-sensei had said was required. The ultimate goal, she told him, was to be able to control a puppet with only one finger, a puppeteer's skill being measured in how many puppets they can control at once. That however was a goal he was very far from accomplishing.

As he continued to practice, he could feel another person in the field watching him, he turned to see Umino Iruka, his academy instructor, standing behind him. The man Naruto considered to be an older brother or even uncle, was smiling in pride as he watched his former student try to master his chosen art.

"Iruka-sensei?"

"Hello Naruto. I wanted to see how you were doing with your training."

"It's going great! I'll master multiple puppets in no time."

The Chunin smiled again. "I'm sure you will. Actually I wanted to talk to you about one of your puppets."

"Nani? Which one?"

"Well after seeing your new fox puppet…"

"Kyu."

"Right, Kyu,… I started wondering if you still had that first puppet you made, the…uh…f…female one." It was obvious that the Chunnin, was nervous discussing Naruto's rather raunchy creation, having been the victim of it's charms once or twice.

Naruto smiled at the memories. "Ok, what about her?" The teacher took a deep breath.

"I had a suggestion to make, c…could you please take her…it…out of its scroll?"

The boy laughed. "Ohh I get it. You wanted to peek at it."

"What? N…no, it's not like that! Just take out the puppet!"

Naruto continued to laugh as he complied. He knew that Iruka wasn't that perverted, but it was so much fun to tease him.

The scantily clad puppet appeared in a puff of smoke, this time without the theatrics that usually accompanied the entrance. Iruka cleared his throat nervously. _'It's so life like'. _He steeled himself.

"Ok Naruto, now I want you to use it to attack me."

After a moment's hesitation, Naruto took out a kuni and tossed it into the air, where he directed the puppet to catch it, and prepaired the mostly nude kunoichi to charge forward. Before he could move however, Iruka raised his hand in a gesture that clearly meant 'wait'.

"That's what I figured. That puppet doesn't have any weapons other than its looks does it?" '_Though if looks could kill…'_

Naruto dumbly shook his head, realization dawning on him.

"Then I think it might be time to upgrade it, or even rebuild it completely. Both of you're other puppets are highly specialized to fit certain situations, however you're only combat puppet is Blade. You should build this one into another combat type that can cover the weaknesses of the others. Those are the same basic principals that go into the Genin team selections. Well anyway it's something to think about. See you later, Naruto." The boy nodded in understanding. It was definitely something that would warrant more thought, however that was for another time as another idea came to him.

"Hey Iruka-Sensei…wanna treat me to some Ramen?"

A small bell rang as the door to the weapon shop opened. The owner, who had been busy sorting through a new shipment of Kuni, turned to see who had come in. and spotted the orange jumpsuit of his new favorite customer. "Back again so soon, Naruto?" "Yep, what do you have as far as long-range weapons?" A bright smile crawled over the man's face. _'Yup, my favorite customer indeed.' _

After another lucrative shopping trip, that would leave Naruto Ramen-less for at least two weeks, unless of course he could trick Iruka into buying him more…again, he found himself at home making major alterations to his Kunoichi. Gone, or at least covered, was the lingerie. In its place were a fishnet shirt, which could be seen through, and a very short skirt. Slung along her waist was a quiver, which held a full load of arrows, to go along with the compound stringed longbow he had picked up. It was very sturdy and built for range and power. The clothes he chose to keep, at least in part, the puppets original purpose as a distraction and, in the case of perverts, as an incapacitation tool. The real changes however came inside it. To help his aim he had equipped it with one camera in its left eye. This one had a special zoom function, which also fed to the small screen he carried with him.

He had spent all night tinkering with it, and had been startled by his alarm clock going off, signaling that he had a very short amount of time to meet with his team. After hastily getting dressed he made his way to their bridge.

Naruto was cursing their latest client. At the briefing, he had, loudly, protested the fact that they were going to receive another D rank mission. His impatience was rewarded with a C rank bodyguard job. The next thing he knew he was getting verbally abused by some, drunk, bridge builder.

They were now walking along the road that would lead them to the man's home country. Naruto was occupying himself by practicing with Kyu. He had determined, taking the Hokage's advice to heart, that if he could keep their client convinced that it was a real living fox, then he would have mastered it. To that end he had asked the others to treat it as if it were real.

As they were traveling, Naruto would have it run ahead and 'sniff' around the tree line, as if investigating something interesting, all the while taking nondescript glances at the screen he held in his hand. Kakashi silently approved of the boy's self imposed training, and wished that Sakura would devote herself similarly.

Ahead of them Naruto saw a smallish puddle of water in the road, He made Kyu, walk ahead of them and 'drink' from the water until they caught up. On a whim he looked at the screen expecting to see a reflection of Kyu in the water. What he saw instead took a minute to sink in. There was another set of eyes watching him, or rather Kyu. Someone was hiding in the water. As they walked by, Naruto quietly motioned to his teacher.

"Kakashi-sensei…"

"I know, just keep walking."

Naruto sent Kyu off into the trees, and followed his senseis order. After a few minutes he saw, through the screen, two people emerge from the water, and join a long chain between them. He casually reached for the white scroll on his hip and bit his thumb.

As the two approached he turned to face them, before he could complete his summoning of Blade, Kakashi was wrapped up in chains, and torn apart.

In a puff of smoke Naruto sent Blade into the path of the closer of the two, even as they continued their charge. The move took the man by surprise and both of the puppets arms pierced the nin's chest. He fell to the ground in a heap, as his brother let out a cry of rage. This was quickly cut off though by a string kick to the head courtesy of Sasuke. The man stumbled and charged at Naruto, who stood in shock looking strait at the man he had just killed. He barely even noticed as the second of the Demon Brothers was halted a few feet from Naruto's own death, by the strong grip of Kakashi, much to the other's surprise.

The Jounin tied the one unconscious nin to a tree and covered the corpse with its own cloak, before sending one of his nin dogs back to Konoha with a message for ANBU to pick them up. A short while later they found themselves on a small boat heading into the Wave Country. The bridge builder reviled to them that he lied when he applied for the mission, because his village didn't have enough money for a higher ranked team. Reluctantly Kakashi agreed to continue with the mission. During the ride Naruto hadn't said a single word. He just sat, with Kyu, 'asleep' in his lap. Kakashi moved close to him.

"Are you ok?"

"…"

"Naruto, we're ninja, sometimes it is necessary for us to kill. What you did was in self defense, there is no shame in that."

"…Yea…"

Unconvinced, Kakashi reached into his hip pouch and produced a small familiar scroll. "Here, the Hokage told me to give this to you, if the mission required you to take a life."

Naruto instantly recognized the scroll as being one from Chyo's three scrolls. He opened it curious as to its contents. It contained only a few words, mostly what Kakshi had just told him, followed by the phrase, "Get over it."

Oddly enough, Naruto felt better. He had taken his first life in battle, he was no longer innocent, but for some reason, the bluntness of the words made him feel better about it.

They had reached the other side without incident. After a while of walking Naruto suddenly stiffened and threw a Kuni into the trees. Upon further investigation, he found a small white rabbit. He was now confused, he was sure that he had felt a person there. Years of people looking at him with hatred in their eyes had made him highly sensitive to when someone was watching him. No there was someone there, and from the look on Kakashi and Sasuke's faces they had noticed it too. Sakura, meanwhile had started to bash him over the head while yelling at him.

Kakashi continued to stare at the startled animal, until he heard a large object coming at them from behind.

"Everyone down!!"

As they all hit the ground a large sword impacted into the tree next to them. A tall man stood on its handle.

"You must be the Copy Cat Ninja, Hatake Kakashi, no wonder the Demon Brothers failed. There's quite a page on you in the Mist's Bingo Book."

"Momochi Zabuza, former member of the Seven Swordsmen, and Nukinin of the Hidden Mist Village. You're in my Bingo Book as well."

The man turned to face them. "I'm honored."

Kakashi lifted his headband to uncover his left eye. "Listen to me all of you, no matter what happens don't get involved. I'll handle this."

"Well, well, bringing out the Sharingan, for me already? I truly AM honored."

Sasuke was staring at his teacher in shock, even as they took up a defensive position in front of Tazuna. Sasuke and Sakura both held kuni before them, while Naruto held not only a kuni but his white scroll. Kyu, he had left in the bushes next to them in case he needed it.

"I guess I'll have to deal with you first eh, Kakashi?"

He disappeared and landed on the ground behind Kakashi, his right arm pointed strait up and left in a seal at his chest.

"Hiding Mist Technique."

All of their vision became blurry, as a thick fog coated the area. The hazy figure of Zabuza seemed to melt into the background, becoming all but invisible.

The area suddenly filled with a powerful killing intent.

"Jugular, clavical vein, corated artery, liver, lungs, heart, kidney, spine. Eight critical points to choose from. Now which one should I go for first?"

The dark voice seemed to come from everywhere and nowhere at once. All three of the Genin, felt paralyzed by the fear coursing through them. For Sasuke, it seemed like it would never end. He could see only one way out. Slowly he turned the kuni in his hand towards his own stomach.

"Sasuke!" the voice of their sensei seemed to cut through the fear and clear their heads.

"Don't worry; I won't let any of my comrade's die." As if to prove his point, he flared his Chakra, in such a way that the force of it actually dispersed the mist within a small area and the killing intent along with it.

Now that he was reviled the former Mist nin was actually standing in the same place as before. Everyone trained their eyes on him, as he quickly disappeared, only to appear again directly in the center of the formation of Team 7, his massive sword poised to kill all four of them in a single stroke.

His red Sharringan spinning wildly, Kakashi put on a burst of speed that surprised them all. He pushed all four of his allies out of the way, and thrust a kuni into Zabuzas stomach, only for another one to appear behind him when the first one dispersed in a splash of water.

"IT'S OVER!"

Kubikiri Hocho, cleaved through Kakashi easily also revealing a Water Clone. The nukenin had only a moment of recognition as another kakashi placed a Kuni at his throat.

"Yes, it is."

The excited cheers of his students were cut off as this one too was revealed to be a clone. The real Zabuza came at Kakashi from behind, His heavy sword imbedding itself into the ground as the Leaf Jounin sidestepped the attack.

Zabuza followed this through, by pivoting on the sword itself and thrusting a kick to the man's midsection. Kakashi was thrown back into the water where he was trapped in a sphere of water.

"Like I said Kakashi. It's over."

Various things ran through the heads of the Genin of Team 7. They wondered how they had gotten into this situation. Thus far, things had happened to fast for them to keep up. For Naruto, at least, this wasn't the first time he had experience the fast pace of a life or death battle. Thing that were going on now had happened similarly when he fought against the traitorous Chunin, Mizuke. At that time, his teacher had been incapacitated and it had been up to him to save the day, and like that time, his teacher had been telling him to leave and save himself. He had won that fight, as he would this one. However there were several key differences this time around. First, Naruto wasn't alone, he had his team standing with him. The opponent they were fighting was also vastly stronger than Mizuke had been. It was fine though, they didn't need to beat the Missing Nin. The final difference was that their teacher wasn't gravely injured like Iruka had been, he was only captured. They had to free Kakashi, so he could beat Zabuza.

As these thoughts crossed his mind, as if making matters worse just to aggravate him, a water clone emerged from the water before them. "Well, kids, let's play." With that the clone rushed towards them and backhanded Naruto a ways away from where he had stood, as Sasuke attempted to fend the clone off, to no avail. He was hammered into the ground and the Water Clone planted it's foot on the boy's back pinning him to the ground.

Seeing that it was now up to him, since Sakura was 'guarding' Tazuna, Naruto crossed his fingers before him in a seal. "Get off him! KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!"

Fifteen clones appeared, surrounding the false Zabuza, as it looked around himself in amusement.

"Kage Bunshin huh? Interesting."

Mirroring his clone's thoughts, Zabuza turned to his captive. "Solid clones, and quite a few of them too, surprising brat you have there Kakashi."

In response the Leaf Jounin smirked at them as if they were just enjoying a sunny afternoon together. "You have no idea. It wasn't me who killed one of your 'Demon Brothers' with hardly any effort. That "brat" even noticed their ambush before I did. You've underestimated them all. If you surrender now we can still go our own separate ways. Otherwise, those kids will cause your downfall."

Zabuza snorted in contempt. "Please Kakashi, I expected more from you."

The jounin shrugged and took out a small orange book. "Your funeral."

There was slightly more confidence in his voice than he felt however. He had told them to run before but should have known that they wouldn't. He had taught them never to leave a comrade behind. Regretfully, it was one of the few things he had taught them. He didn't regret for a second taking them on as his students, but he wished that he had been a better teacher. Letting them develop in their own way was good and all in theory, until someone mislabels a mission. This is the result of such mistakes. If they survived this, he swore to himself that he would do better by them.

Naruto smirked as the clone eyed the clones. Without looking, he cast thin chakra strings into the bushes behind him, and moved Kyu around the fight passed Tazuna, who eyed the fox curiously as it ran by and into the foliage near the water.

Finally tired of this laughable stand off, the clone put pressure onto Sasukes back, eliciting a grunt of pain from the raven haired teen.

Naruto couldn't afford to wait anymore, the clones charged forward and buried their target under a mountain of bodies. With a yell the water clone swiped them all off of him with its massive sword. Taking that as his signal Naruto flexed his finger, while Sasuke, now free, was rolling to his feet and hopping back away from the clone begining his own series of seals. A senbon launched from Kyu's hiding spot imbedded itself into the side of the clones head, and it exploded in a shower of water.

Zabuza and Kakashi, however, only saw the flying bodies of clones, the explosion of water, and a multitude of fire balls coming at them courtesy of the recently freed Sasuke.

"KATON: PHENOX FLOWER NO JUTSU!"

Zabuza grinned, and slammed his foot down on the chakra-charged water, and a large wave lifted up, effectively blocking the fire balls, however, not the Kuni hidden with in them. They caught him slightly by surprise, and he brought his sword around, swiping them away.

With the distraction caused by the surprise attack, Zabuza barely noticed the pinprick on his right arm as a thin senbon needle pierced it just above the elbow.

He glanced down at it in confusion, and then alarm as his arm suddenly fell lifelessly to his side, numb from the shoulder down. He looked over at the shore line to see a small fox jump up onto the orange clad boy's shoulder, seemingly controlled by his hand movements.

As the water prison fell away, Kakashi calmly put away his reading material, and stood up, red eye swirling. "By the way Zabuza, I wasn't exaggerating."

The Nuke-nin found a Kuni at his throat, and knew he was beaten. He hung his head and two more senbon pierced his neck. The man fell into the water instantly. All eyes turned to Naruto.

"What? I didn't do it."

A figure appeared next the boy then. He wore the white mask of a Hunter Ninja.

"No it was me. Thank you for disabling him for me. I've been looking for an opportunity to kill him for weeks now."

AN: Wow, sorry about the long time in between updates. I've been having some problems with my internet connection, and I just started a new job. To make up for it, Chapter 7 will be up within the next few days, and it will be the longest chapter yet. It will also take us up to the end of the wave arc.


	7. Chapter 7

Puppets of the Leaf

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 7

When Tazuna's home finally came within view, the three students were watching Kakashi nervously. He glanced back at them for a second before, finally unable to bear the looks, he asked. "What? Do I have something on my face?"

At any other time it would have made them all crash to the floor, because yes, he did actually have a mask on his face; however they all seemed to be extremely serious about something.

Sakura was the first to speak up. "Ano, Sensei, but what is wrong?"

Mentally, he stiffened. _'Could they…'_

"What do you mean?"

"Something is bothering you, something bad. What is it?"

'_How did they know?'_

"What makes you say that?"

"Since that Mist Hunter-Nin took Zabuza away, you haven't taken out your book once." This was from their dark-haired teammate.

'…_ohh…oops.'_

Outwardly he sighed. "I see, well then yes. There was something definitely wrong with that. First it was the manner in which the Hunter nin disposed of the body."

Sakura looked at him questioningly, "Why? What was wrong with it?"

"The fact that we don't know. Hunter Nin usually dispose of a body at the scene. You see a ninja's body contains many secrets of the village, techniques medicines, and the like. If I were killed then someone would try to examine my Sharringan, and attempt to replicate it. It is the job of Hunter Ninja to keep these secrets from falling into the hands of a hostile, and sometimes allied, village."

They all fell silent as the information was taken in.

"Add to that the choice of weapons, as you probably know Naruto, Senbon are a medical tool, rarely used by ninja as weapons, it is very difficult to hit a vital spot for a killing blow, unless it was poisoned of course. However unless fired from some kind of launcher, like Naruto's puppets, the user would run the risk of poisoning him/herself."

Naruto nodded with the man's assessment of the weapon choice, he couldn't even count the amount of times he'd stuck himself with the things, putting his hand to sleep as a result, of the toxin used. It was part of the reason he didn't use poisons.

"So, you don't think Zabuza's dead?" The bridge builder looked sharply at the blonde, all color draining from his face.

Kakashi shook his head. "No, he isn't dead, he'll be back and next time he won't underestimate any of you."

There was a unified gulp from all three of the gennin. "Naruto, how long would that toxin, last before wearing off?" The boy thought about it for a minute, contemplating Zabuza's height, weight, as well as his own experiences with the paralysis.

"Well it's stronger than the stuff I used on that stupid cat so… maybe two or three days, till he'd be fully recovered."

Kakashi nodded his head. "I see. Also taking into account the debilitating effects of the senbon in his neck, we'll have a little less than a week. Mostly because he'll have to avoid medications since they don't know what you drugged him with."

They reached their destination without incident, and Kakashi proceeded to lay out a training regimen for them. When Zabuza came back, he wouldn't be alone. The Gennin would have to fight as well.

Kakashi watched with an amused smile as Sakura, rather loudly proclaimed her success in reaching a high branch of the tree. The others had only managed to make it about halfway up theirs, but these were the results he had expected. Sakura seemed to have near perfect control of her Chakra, now if only they could build up her reserves she'd be able to do something with it. She had originally seemed to be a natural Genjutsu user, however since she seemed to adopt the role of support for the others, and lacked the imagination it would take to come up with the illusions, he thought about getting her some medical training. It had certainly helped to have a medic on his own team.

The other two were making steady progress up the tree, both competing with the other and pushing each other to be better. Kakashi had no doubt that Sasuke saw Naruto as a rival. Naruto had always viewed the other boy as such, however Sasuke had only seemed to see it during their more recent missions, as Naruto had displayed more of his skills with his puppets.

In truth he had to admit the boy was becoming more skilled with them, often using misdirection, and combined with his Kage Bunshin, Naruto was definitely becoming formidable.

Sakura was about out of chakra, so Kakashi had her come down from the tree and return to the house. He told the others to work until they had exhausted their chakra, then return. If they hadn't mastered it by the end of the day then Sakura would accompany him to the bridge the next morning, while they continued to work on the exercise.

The thought of being left behind if Zabuza showed up that day… no, they were determined to master it that night.

Kakashi sat at the diner table with Sakura and Tazuna's family, when the door opened and the two boys walked in, leaning on each other for support. Both were dirty and breathing heavily.

"We…both made it…all the way… to the top." Naruto proclaimed with a smile, to which Sasuke merely nodded.

Sakura congratulated them loudly, while a vision of himself, and his own best friend, practically his brother, floated across them. Kakashi shook off the ghosts from his past.

"Good work you two, sit and eat, then get some sleep. Tomorrow, we'll start something new."

Naruto came down the stairs to see Sakura going through a short series of hand seals. A slight green glow spread over her hands, and she let out a smile as she looked at Kakashi nodding his head in acknowledgement. "Hey, what technique is that?" Naruto came into the room and stood behind the pink-haired girl. "It's a medical Jutsu, capable of healing minor injuries. With practice it can be built up to major wounds as well." Kakashi sat with a hot cup of tea in his hand. In the back of his mind, Naruto wondered how the man was drinking it with a mask on.

"Wow that's awesome Sakura-chan, now you can fix him up when the Teme, accidentally cuts of his foot off with a Kunai." The boy's comment was rewarded with a lock of hair being cut off by one of the aforementioned throwing knives sailing past his head, courtesy of the raven-haired boy who'd just entered the room.

For a moment, Kakashi thought the girl would get some practice using her new skill, until the two boys smirked at each other and sat down. It seemed that they had evolved their relationship into a friendly rivalry, like the one he shared with Mighto Guy. Though he would die before admitting it, the odd ninja was one of his best friends.

After breakfast, he led the three of them out to the clearing they had adopted as their training field. "As I said yesterday, we are quickly ruining out of time. Sakura will come to the bridge with me today. I have some other things I want you two to work on here, where you wont kill anyone in the process. Starting tomorrow all of us will be going to the bridge, so make today count, it's all we have."

"Sensei, if we're pressed for time, shouldn't I stay here and practice also?"

"Sakura, we're going to a civilian construction site, trust me there will be plenty of opportunities for you to practice the healing technique. Now for you two, Naruto, the other day, I noticed that you were able to control both Blade and Kyu at once…"

"Not exactly sensei, I had to drop most of the strings I had on Blade and move them to Kyu. I barely had enough control to fire that senbon, and keep blade upright."

"I see. Then I want you to work on controlling two puppets at once. The skill will help out greatly during the inevitable fight."

"Hai, Kakashi-sensei," He saluted. "There's a training method in the latest scroll I got from Gi-san that should help." The blonde ran off to the edge of the trees and began to channel his chakra. When Kakashi turned back to his other students, he saw Sasuke rubbing his eyes in irritation. "You ok?" he asked knowingly.

"Hai, I just have something in my eyes, I'm fine." Kakashi smirked.

'_He's close to it now. Hopefully this training will be enough to push him over the edge.'_

"Ok then I have a new Jutsu for you to learn. As an Uchiha you have a natural affinity for Fire techniques, as I'm sure you already know." The boy nodded.

"Since you already know the grand fire ball, a C-ranked Jutsu, and the Phoenix flower, a B-ranked Jutsu, I'm going to teach you an A-ranked one, if for no other reason than because practicing it will build up you're stamina and chakra reserves. This alone will help when you finally unlock your bloodline."

At the mention of the Sharringan, the boy' head snapped up to meet the gaze of his instructor. "Kakashi-sensei, there's something I've been meaning to ask you…"

Kakashi held up a hand preventing him from continuing. "No, I'm not an Uchiha. However a good friend of mine was, before he was killed along time ago. And no I won't tell you anymore than that right now. Maybe after the mission, if you still want to know, but you'll have to survive this first. Now watch closely, I don't expect you to master this right away, but the training will help greatly."

With that he began a long series of hand seals ending with the Tiger. He raised his fingers to his mask and exhaled a large flame shaped into the form of a long dragon. "Katon: Karyuendan!" the dragon soared around them for a few moments before being dispelled.

For the next few minutes Kakashi showed the boy the signs needed and how to shape his chakra to perform it properly then went back to the house with Sakura to assume their guard duties.

After a while of training in their skills, Sasuke fell back onto the ground breathing heavily. He couldn't remember struggling this much to learn a Jutsu since his father tried to teach him, the Grand fireball. He looked over at his teammate and saw that he was suspended from a high branch by a handful of chakra strings; amazingly he seemed to be doing pull-ups on them. He seemed just as tired as Sasuke, which was odd since the blond usually had twice the endurance of Sasuke, and as he watched the boy began to tremble under the exertion, and fell to the ground.

"Ne, Doe." He called out to him. "Let's go get some food then come back to finish training, if I leave you here you're likely to kill yourself."

He smirked as Naruto threw him what was 'obviously' a hand sign for 'bird', and the two returned to the house, where, much to Naruto's delight, Tsunami made them some ramen.

When they returned to their training, Naruto took out both his white and purple scrolls, and summoned both Blade and his Kunoichi. Finally he brought his hands together in a seal and created six clones of himself. Naruto was attempting to utilize both of his two puppets, against his clones; however he was quickly over matched. They were built to use two completely different Fighting styles, and he just couldn't keep tack of everything that was happening around him. This especially became a problem when a clone managed to knock down his Kunoichi, all of the arrows that were in the quiver at her side fell out and she was effectively disarmed. He cursed as he called the combat to a halt. Together they gathered all of the lost arrows, and Naruto unsealed his toolkit. He handed both the kit and the puppet to a clone and had it set to work fixing the problem. Meanwhile, Naruto continued the sparring session, using Blade with only one hand, as he had been doing all throughout the session, however, now that his attention wasn't divided, he found it to be much easier, and saw the impact that the tree climbing had on his control.

After a couple of hours of this, Naruto was down to only three opponents, it was tough to destroy them because they all knew how the puppet worked as well. The three remaining clones began to attack in tandem, each covering for the others as a three man cell of gennin might, now going not just after the puppet but Naruto as well. Eventually two clones managed to pin down Blade, while the other launched itself off their backs at Naruto, Its fist drawn back to punch the boy. Before either could react though, an arrow pierced its chest and it disappeared in a puff of smoke.

Three sets of blue eyes turned to look at another clone standing behind Kunoichi, with a satisfied look on his face. Naruto began looking for any obvious changes to the puppet, but was brought up short by a sudden realization. "Hey, wait a minute; you can control the puppets too?" He knew they were physical copies of him, but had no idea they could utilize Justus as well, Ideas began to swim pleasantly in his mind, the possibilities were endless.

"Yea I guess," the clone replied now examining the strings. "I wasn't even thinking about it at the time, but I did finish the modifications. The clone flexed his wrist and another arrow slid out of a small hole in its palm. The puppet caught it and knocked it onto the string of the bow, ready to fire, in one fluid motion.

The real Naruto smiled, "Why didn't I think of that?"

Another clone responded. "Um I think, technically, you did."

Naruto switched puppets with his clone, and gave Kyu to another. He then summoned another group of clones, and the melee began again, this time with much greater results.

Naruto watched from up in a tree as Blades attack was stopped by the Kunai held by two clones, The 'mask' that was now painted on rather than the cloth one from earlier, parted down the middle and snapped open to reveal two small cylinders which were already spinning at a high rate. The two clones registered shock at the action, as half a dozen senbon needles shot out and destroyed them. Naruto knew how they must have felt, even he had forgotten all about that feature, and he was the one who built it.

He grinned to himself as he caused Kunoichi to fire an arrow which destroyed two clones at once. He grin vanished however as several clones all turned to look at him at once, even some that were no where near to the two he destroyed. _'Crap not again! That's twice now, what the hell?!' _

Earlier he had been spotted by one clone as he hid in a bush, he destroyed it and suddenly a bunch more jumped him, instantly finding his location, which he thought strange, but figured he had just given himself away when he attacked, now he knew that he hadn't.

Four clones charged his position, and he shot down three of them. Before he could target the last however he realized that he was now out of arrows. He directed Kunoichi to the side and brought her bow down on the clones head as it landed, dispelling it.

He was about to go and try to recover some of his spent arrows when the clone controlling Blade was also destroyed, he stiffened, and smiled as he remembered something vital. He twitched his wrist and another arrow dispensed itself out of the puppets thigh, and there were two more sets in her other arm and leg. Briefly he wondered how he knew that when he wasn't the one who installed them, he was beginning to understand how the clones had found him.

The training continued, with another clone picking up one of the puppets after its controller was destroyed, until just after dark, when Naruto finally called it to an end. He was exhausted, and his clones weren't faring any better. He had them assist in collecting all of the spent weapons, and ammunition, and sealed away the three puppets, then Naruto prepared to dispel the remaining clone, around fifteen of them, and tried to keep alert for any additional information he might receive, to confirm what he suspected about them. What he got was the equivalent of looking for a lit match in a dark room when someone turns on the sun. Naruto was immediately overwhelmed, and suffered an extreme case of vertigo. His world went dark and he fell to the ground.

"You'll catch cold if you sleep out here like this." Naruto groggily sat up at the sound of the angelic voice. He looked around him and found that an attractive girl, close to his own age, was kneeling next to him. He shook his head to clear the sleep from his mind, as the 'girl' laughed at his antics.

"What were you doing out here?"

"I was training."

"Training…are you some kind of ninja?"

The blonde nodded as he straitened his headband, drawing her attention to it.

"And is that a symbol of your home?"

"Yep it's the mark of the Hidden Leaf Village."

Naruto took a quick look at the suns position in the sky and saw that it was only an hour past sunrise. "Wow you're out here pretty early, how come?"

She smiled and held up a basket. "I'm gathering herbs to use in medicines."

Seeing that the basket was only partially full, Naruto volunteered his help in gathering the herbs, seeing as how she was nice enough to wake him up and there was no telling how long he would've slept there, maybe long enough to be found by an enemy ninja or something crazy like that. He picked it up pretty quick, having done something similar on a recent D-rank mission, not that he would _ever_ admit to anyone that any of the _D_umb Ranks missions might actually come in useful later in life. No Gennin would ever admit to that, it was an unspoken law among the younger generations.

They spent another ten minutes or so in silence gathering the plants, before the quiet was broken by the girl as she got up to leave.

"Naruto…why do you train so hard? Is it for you, or someone else?"

'_Why do I train?' _"What do you mean?"

"Well do you have someone in your life, who is precious to you?"

'_someone...'_

The boy was silent for a moment, he almost answered no, after all he was an orphan, and he had no family, except…

Images came to him of his teammates, Kakashi and Iruka-sensei, the old man, and even Chiyo-sensei. A small smile, full of emotion, touched his face.

"Yea, I do have people who are important to me."

She nodded. "True strength comes from our desire to protect those we hold dear to us. Naruto…I believe you will become truly strong. Let's meet again sometime."

As she walked away Naruto waved and called out, "Sure thing, thanks Haku-Chan."

At his comment she stopped and without turning replied, "By the way…I'm a boy."

Naruto, once again fell to the ground, as Sasuke was walking up him, having been searching for him since dawn.

"Who was that, Dobe?

Naruto smiled.

"Teme…I think she's just you're type."

When Sasuke got Naruto back to the house, he promptly fell asleep again. Kakashi had them place him into bed and asked Tsunami to let him sleep until he woke up on his own. And to have him meet them at the bridge when he did.

Only an hour after they left, Naruto came down the stairs, and entered the kitchen. After Tsunami delivered the message that had been left with her, he rushed out the door, highly upset that he had been left behind. He took a shortcut through the trees to get there faster and came across the remains of a wild boar. Looking around him Naruto could see jagged slash marks on the trees. From the looks of things, whoever had done his was heading in the direction of Tazuna's house.

"St…stops! I…w…won't let you take her!" The two swordsmen looked at the kid in amusement. The one with the hat, bent close to Tsunami's ear. "It's too bad lady, he might have lived a while longer."

"Inari! No…plea…" The second hit her in the head with the hilt of his sword, silencing her pleas.

"Mom!...Ugh!"

Before he could blink the two men were standing over him with their swords poised to end his life. "Stupid brat." They brought their swords down on him and three pieces of a log fell to the floor.

"What the hell!" They turned to see an orange clad boy between them and their objective, and smirked. "Heh, just some dumb kid.

Naruto gestured behind them and a tall shadow loomed over the two. They slashed as they turned only for their swords to be met by the flat blades on the ends of the puppets arms. They had a moment to register shock and fear before falling to the ground in a heap as the puppets legs slashed out at them, slicing them deep across their midsections with similar blades as the ones on its arms.

The two were quite obviously dead, or would be soon enough from blood loss; however this fact didn't bother Naruto as much as killing the demon brother had. It still hadn't been an easy thing to do, Killing should never be easy, but he had come to terms with the fact that it was sometimes necessary, especially for a ninja, to protect others. "He turned and looked at Inari.

"She'll be ok. Get her into the house." He turned and started moving in the direction of the bridge, but stopped and looked back. "Hey, you did real good Inari. Your dad would be proud." And he left at top speed.

When he arrived at the foot of the bridge, he could barely see anything. The whole of the area was covered in a thick fog, which could only mean that Zabuza was back.

Closer to him Naruto to see a white dome, within which was the, fast moving form of his teammate, Sasuke. He appeared to be dodging some unknown attacker. Naruto hid on the side of the bridge, using his chakra to stick to it like in the tree-walking exercise, and created two clones. He then gave them Kyu and Kunoichi, telling the first to find Kakashi and try to help if possible, but to otherwise stay out of the way. The second he had find a high spot on the bridge and to cover everyone he could. Naruto, himself, sent Blade into the dome to join Sasuke in battle, setting himself up just outside the dome close enough that he could still see inside, and counting on the mist to hide him.

Sasuke was surprised when the dark shape of the puppet appeared in front of him and blocked the incoming senbon with its weapons and body.

"It's about time Dobe." He said with a smirk then began to explain, loudly what had happened sine they got to the bridge, as well as how he suspected the ice mirrors were working. Naruto created another clone and dispelled it immediately, so his clones would also know what was going on.

In response he felt the memories of the clone he gave Kyu too return to him and knew that it had been destroyed and Kyu was motionless near Sakura and Tazuna's. He didn't have time to think about that however as the mist 'ANBU' attacked again. After a few moments the attacks ceased and Naruto had lost sight of their opponent again. He quickly sent instructions to his other clone, via the create/dispel method, and was rewarded when the small screen attached to his inner forearm began to scan the area around the dome.

The view came in on the center of the dome itself and found the ninja hanging from the top of the dome ready to fall on Sasuke and the puppet. When he did fall, Sasuke was pushed aside by Blade as it caught the attack on its hand swords. The Mist Hunter Nin used the momentum to push himself clear of the attack. Naruto didn't give him a chance to regroup. The face mask on the puppet split down the middle and hinged open to reveal two small cylinders where its mouth was supposed to be. They started spinning rapidly in opposite directions and began to shoot out senbon needles of its own, at a rapid pace, and tracked the ninja's movements. As he escaped back into the mirrors a few of the needles bounced harmlessly off its surface.

Attacks continued like this for a few more minutes, and Naruto noticed his puppet responding more sluggishly as its joints were becoming clogged by the enemies' senbon, and he had used up his whole supply of them.

The attacks ceased, and Naruto could see, from the way Sasuke was looking around him almost frantically, that he had also lost sight of their opponent. Naruto updated his clones again and he watched as the small screen on his arm again began to search for the missing Nin.

Finally it zoomed in on a small orange blob outside of the dome. Naruto's blood ran cold, the blob was obviously him, and behind him another mirror and formed and sticking halfway out of it was their enemy; he was leaning down over him, nearly looking over his shoulder.

"I see, interesting, I was wondering how you were fighting so effectively form outside the mirrors." Naruto turned slowly and saw a sandaled foot coming at his head.

Beside Sasuke, Blade fell lifelessly to the ground as if his strings had been cut, and Naruto tumbled into the dome, with a smear of blood coming from his lip, and a needle sticking from his shoulder.

The Mist Nin appeared in the mirror behind the blonde boy as he, shakily, got to his feet, holding up needles in preparation of a killing blow. When the attack was launched, Sasuke moved into the path of it, taking the bulk of the needles for his teammate.

Naruto caught him as he fell, a look of shock and horror covering his face.

"I g…guess, this is…as far…as I was able…to get…ehhh…Dobe." As the last of the boy's energy left him, Sasuke raised his hand and flicked Naruto in the forehead, and then he too fell as limp as the blondes puppet.

"A shame, about your friend, he wouldn't have had to die if you'd just stayed out of our way."

Naruto slowly turned to gaze at the ninja who was still hiding in the mirror, is vision was turning red, and a feral scream tore through the air. As Naruto slowly rose, he extended a hand towards his fallen puppet and chakra strings, as thick with chakra as two of the boy's fingers, and as red as the blood that flowed through his veins, grabbed hold of the puppet and the senbon seemed to tear out of it's joints as it rose into the air, with the red chakra pouring into its hollow body.

The enraged puppeteer swept his hand forward, and the puppet shot at the mirror at a speed it was previously incapable of reaching, its swords poised to attack and literally dripping with the evil chakra.

As the demonically enhanced metal slashed through the mirror, the pieces began to shatter under the force of the evil power emanating from the boy. The Hunter Nin fell from one of the larger shards of ice, once again trying to come at the boy from above. With out looking up Naruto flicked his wrist and Blade intercepted the attack by crashing into the Nin. It wrapped its arms and legs around his body effectively immobilizing him, and Naruto's fist connected with his face, freeing the Nin of his confines and sending him through the crumbling ice to roll along the ground for a few feet. The rest of the mirrors crashed to the ground as Naruto stalked towards him with Sasuke slung over the arms of the puppet.

When the Nin looked up at Naruto, his mask cracked and fell away. All at once the evil chakra vanished as a shocked expression spread over the blondes face. "Ha…ku…"

"Naruto, I too have someone who is precious to me. Someone I would give my life for."

Images of their earlier conversation danced through his mind, and distantly, he heard the chirping of a flock of birds.

Naruto barely noticed that the mist was now gone, too much had just happened. When Haku began to move in the direction of his sensei, it was by pure instinct that made Naruto try to stop him, but the effort was too slow, it looked as though Haku would intercept the attack, until he stumbled when an arrow grazed his leg, just above the knee.

The wound wasn't nearly enough to stop the boy, but it slowed him down by a about a full step, just enough it seemed for the boy to catch the attack with his bare hand and push it off course, right into Zabuza's, already useless, arm. While his own hand was annialated by the lightening.

"I am sorry Zabuza; I have failed you as your tool." When he spoke, much to the Leaf Jounins further surprise, Haku's voice was even and resigned, displaying none of the pain he must have been in.

"No, Haku. We're both still alive right now. You haven't failed me..."

The recoil of the Chidori had dispelled most of the dogs that were holding the jounin, and Kakashi released the rest. Now unsupported, Zabuza fell forward onto his knees. He looked t the charred, bloody stump of what was Haku's right hand. "Such a price to pay for my life Haku."

"I would pay that and more a thousand times over, if it will save you." The boy was so determined to continue to defend his master; he rose shakily to his feet and prepared to go into a series of seals. The attack never came as Zabuza suddenly lurched forward with a grunt of pain.

Haku caught him as he fell, eyes transfixed on the large curved sword that was sticking out of his back. All eyes turned to see a rather large man with a grin tossing a similar sword up and down with one hand. Next to him was the short form of Gato. The small man was currently handing the larger one a handful of coins. Zabuza managed to get himself turned around in Haku's arms and cast an enraged look over the assembled group of thugs. "Gato..."

Haku pulled aside the man's bandages to prevent him from choking on the blood that was now filling his mouth.

"I should thank you leaf ninja, for wearing him out for me so much. He was a rather costly asset to maintain. Even all of these men cost me half of what he would have. Maybe we can work out a finder's fee of some kind if you'll stay out of things from now on."

Zabuza sighed as he tried to stand. "Kakashi…It looks like our fight has ended. No hard feelings. I have a lot of respect for you and your brats."

The leaf Jounin covered his Sharringan. "Hai, It's been a while since I've had a fight of that caliber. What now?"

Zabuza straitened as much as possible with a large weapon sticking out of his back. "Now, I settle up with Gato." He tried to flex the fingers on his left arm, to no avail, and looked to his fallen sword forlornly. "It looks as though Kubikiri Hocho and I won't be crossing over together."

Everyone around him then stared with wide eyes as Zabuza's arm, seemingly of its own accord, reached to retrieve the blade from where it lay, and brought the large sword to eye level. As if in answer to the unasked question, lines of chakra began to thicken until they were about the thickness of a finger, and all could see that they were connected to several places along the mans arm.

"The nerves were damaged in the fight, so you're arm isn't receiving the signals your brain is sending. I can act as a bridge for them." Naruto walked up until he was next to where Kakashi was standing.

Zabuza flexed his arm again, testing out his restored mobility. The timing was a little off, but nothing he couldn't compensate for. "Thanks kid."

Haku in turn, bowed to the orange clad boy in thanks. "Anno, you're friend should regain consciousness soon, Naruto-san."

Naruto stood motionless and shocked at the news. "Sasuke…"

His surprise almost caused him to lose his concentration over what he was doing, but managed to hang on to the technique.

Haku turned and stood next to his master. Zabuza glanced at him with a raised eyebrow. "Haku…"

"Both of your weapons will be crossing over with you to the other side. I will not fail you again."

Zabuza smiled. "I'd rather cross over with a friend, Haku. Tools won't do me much good where I'm likely to go."

The ice user looked away at his words, a single tear running down his face.

"How touching. Are you two ready to die yet?" Gato was eagerly tapping his cane in annoyance. They ignored him.

"How are you on chakra?"

"I have enough Zabuza-san."

The man's smile tightened. "Leave Gato till the end."

The boy began doing left-handed seals and stomped the ground next to him. As a large splash of water rose into the air, it froze and split into hundreds of needles, which shot out into the crowded mass of thugs, instantly killing the first two rows.

Immediately following the attack the two ran forward into the remaining enemies, killing as they went. All who stood before them fell in a shower of blood and screams. Zabuza hacked and slashed with his large blade, taking them out two and three at a time, while Haku was the picture of precision, killing them with single hits to their vital areas with his senbon needles. He was moving out ahead of the man, attempting to thin their numbers and clear a path to where Gato had retreated at the edge of the unfinished bridge.

As deadly and unstoppable as they were, the two weren't escaping unscathed. One thug managed to plunge his sword into Zabuza's stomach, a second put his spear into the man's back and a third stuck a knife in his side. Lost in his mad rage, Zabuza spun around and killed all three, and then some, in one vicious pass of his sword.

Blade, formally lying forgotten on the ground had been replaced by Kunoichi as Naruto's remaining clone sent it to join the fight. However, as it closed, Zabuza swiped it away with the flat side of his sword. "Stay out of it brat, you've done enough." The puppet returned to their side and the clone dispersed itself. Kakashi looked on with a sideways glance at his student. "You know when I said to practice using more than one puppet at once, that wasn't exactly what I meant."

Naruto smirked. "Yea but it works in a pinch."

Back in the fight, Haku had also received injuries similar to those of his master. He was losing his momentum, and knew that his time would soon come. They were almost at their target, and Haku leapt over the heads of several thugs, only for them to die at the hands of Zabuza as they watched Haku jump. When the boy landed, there was only one more person between him and the shouting Gato. The thug lunged forward with his spear as the boy landed in front of him, and the head of the spear plunged into Haku's stomach. The boy paused for a second looking at the man who was holding the weapon, then threw his last senbon into his forehead.

Gato watched with a satisfied smirk as both the henchman, and the Ice brat fell in death. His smug look turned to one of despair when he looked behind them at the oncoming form of The Demon of the Bloody Mist Village. Zabuza was charging strait at him, screaming his death cries and hefted his large blade over his head as he too leapt into the air.

The last thing Gato saw on this earth was the true form of the Demon before him, seemingly bathed in the fires of hell, as the sun shone brightly behind him.

The Zanbato came down onto his head and cleaved the bastard cleanly in two. The remains fell into the water below and the area grew deathly silent.

The attacks ceased as the tyrant's death shocked the remaining thugs into a frozen stupor.

Naruto sagged and fell back to sit on the bridge, the technique had taken a lot out of him, and distantly he heard Zabuza's sword clatter to the ground. In truth using his chakra strings in that manner was something that was only mentioned in his latest scrolls; even then he had only glanced at it. The idea of controlling another living person against their will repulsed him in a way that killing hadn't even come close to. However he had never considered that he could use it on a willing person like he had with Zabuza.

It suddenly struck him that he had, actually helped the man who was until just recently an enemy, and that he didn't really think of Zabuza that way. Maybe it was the fact that he and Haku were so much alike, maybe it was because they were both thought of as demons, he couldn't be sure, but he did know that the two were now his comrades. You don't abandon comrades.

Zabuza turned and walked back towards where Haku had fallen. He could see right away that the boy was dead. Silent tears crawled down the Nuke-nins face. He didn't kid himself; he knew that he wouldn't go to the same place as his kind-hearted friend.

He sank to his knees beside the boy, at least determined to die next to him, as those few thugs who had survived surrounded them with angry looks on their faces. They began shouting angrily at them, "Bastards killed our meal ticket!" one shouted over the others. They all brandished their weapons, and prepared to descend on them. They drove forward and all that could be heard for a while was the sickening sounds of metal rending flesh and bone.

The mob stopped their onslaught, and stepped back with a communal gasp. Before them were the bodies of two of their own, two that had been killed earlier by the two ninja.

They began looking around in a panic and found their targets lying on the bridge near where the Leaf ninja were standing, The Jounin was leaning on the forgotten blade of his former enemy. Zabuza's chest was rising unsteadily. For the moment it looked as though all of the thugs were forgotten.

They took a step forward, and stopped as three Naruto's puffed into existence each controlling one of his three puppets. Just behind him he could hear Zabuza talking to his fallen friend and student. "Haku…you were always more than just a tool to me…though…I never understood.…Ne, Kakashi…"

The Leaf jounin knelt down beside them still leaning on the sword. "Hmm?"

"Do me a favor…burry me next to him…"

"Sure thing. You have my word."

"Thanks…take care of your brats…" He turned to look up at his former enemy and his eyes caught his sword. "…and my sword…you keep it… so I know that someone worthy wields it."

Kakashi's one visible eye widened considerably. "Zabuza…I will keep it well."

The man nodded and looked strait up to see snow falling from the sky. "Haku…are you doing that?"

With that the Demon of the Bloody Mist, was gone.

After the fight was over the rest of their time in the Wave country seemed to fly by.

Tazuna had a sudden flood of volunteers for the construction, and there were no further attempts to disrupt the project, since Gato was now dead. The Leaf Ninja buried Haku and Zabuza on a bluff overlooking the water. Kakashi had begun to wear the large sword given to him by his one-time enemy. "Getting used to the weight" he had told them.

Finally the bridge was finished and their mission was complete. As they made their way home, they discovered that the townspeople had decided to name the bridge after Naruto.

The boy was flattered of course, but he just wanted to get back to the village. The mission had been more than they bargained for, however, they had grown so much from the experience, both in skills and in their personalities. Besides Naruto was sure that after all they had gone through, the old man would owe him a few new scrolls.

AN: And there's chapter seven, Alot more puppet use than in the others. CHapter eight will be out soon as a filler for the upcomming Exams. I know some of you are looking forward to Naruto's encounter with Kankouro, so i hope it won't disapoint.

Kakashi getting Zabuza's sword...I was struck by a sudden vision of Kakashi dueling Kisami with it. _grins evilly _

Thanks allfor the reviews, please keep them comming.


	8. Chapter 8

Puppets of the leaf

Puppets of the leaf

Chapter 8

Naruto lay on his bed staring up at the ceiling. Team 7 had been given a few days off despite their insistence that it wasn't required. Naruto had fixed all of his puppets and was feeling restless. With a frustrated sigh, he pushed himself up and stomped out the door, looking for something to do. Normally he would be practicing with his puppets, however the hokage had expressly forbidden it or else he would burn the rest of the scrolls that Chiyo had given him.

On the way back from the Wave country Naruto had asked Kakashi about the special abilities he'd discovered about the Kage Bunshin technique, and had been told that it was as he'd figured out. When a clone is either destroyed or dispelled, any knowledge, it gained is transferred, along with any remaining chakra, and experience back to the others that were left along with Naruto. The drawback was that it also transferred back its exhaustion. He was also told that it was originally used for information gathering, and he was the first person who had enough chakra to use it to its full potential. He had wanted desperately to begin experimenting, but again the Hokage's threat hung over him.

At first he had thought about going to build a new puppet, but the source of all his materials, the kind old man at the weapon shop, had also been told of his restrictions, and laughed silently to him self as Naruto stormed out of the shop, cursing the hokage as he left.

And so he now found himself wandering around the town looking for something to do and someone to do it with. He had reached the area known as the Uchiha Sector and decided that if all of his restrictions left him without things to do, he might as well hang around someone with similar restrictions.

He walked through the area, looking at all of the abandoned houses, and overgrown gardens. The boy was suddenly reminded that he never saw or heard his teammate talk about his family, and wondered if he had one. Finally he found the object of his search, standing on a dock in a large pond, forming seals. The Uchiha put his hand to his mouth and blew out a large fire dragon. It swept around the water before diving in, extinguishing itself in a large plume of steam.

Sasuke's breathing was labored; he must have been at it for a while. He turned sharply as he heard someone call out to him.

"Oy, Teme! We're not supposed to be training, remember?"

The boy smirked at his loud teammate.

"He doesn't have a whole bunch of scrolls from an old hag to hold over me, Dobe."

Insulting Chiyo in front of the boy was sure to get to him every time, even if it was only in jest, which Naruto knew it was. It didn't stop him, however, from tossing a handful of Kunai at Sasuke.

As they continued their mental spar, the third member of their team arrived, waving to them to follow her. On the way to their training ground, she told them that Kakashi had found her and sent her to tell them to all meet at the small bridge which was their usual spot.

When Kakashi finally showed up, after his customary excuses, he informed them that he was nominating them for the Chunnin Selection Exams, and the reason they had been given time off was to allow them to rest up. They would need it.

The decision to enter was completely up to them, however, so there was no pressure if they thought they weren't ready. This brought snorts of amusement mixed with a little contempt for the comment, even from, surprisingly, Sakura.

After the Jounin left to report in to the Hokage about their entry, at least that's what he said he was doing, Naruto suspected that he was just going to read his porn, Sasuke left to go back to his training, and Naruto found himself walking down a street with Sakura, about to get some lunch, though it was strictly not a date. That much they agreed on, even if they couldn't decide where to go.

Sakura looked over her shoulder for the fifth time in as many minutes, to see a small square rock following them. "Uh…hey, Naruto?"

They boy sighed, then smiled. "Yea I know…just play along."

His smile spread wider, reminding her of a fox. "Hey Sakura, you want to see my new _rock destroying_ Jutsu?"

Sakura picked up on where this was going. "Sure, but where will be get a rock suitable to _pulverize_."

By this point the 'rock' began to tremble.

Naruto walked up to the 'rock'. "Hey here's one that should do nicely." He began to run through random hand seals, without molding any chakra. He brought his hand up. "Better back up Sakura, this is going to send pieces everywhere. SUPER ROCK CRUSHER NO JUTSU!" Naruto brought his hand down and slammed it onto the top of the 'rock' with a loud slap. From within the box, there came several yelps and some cursing. The rock then exploded into plumes of multicolored smoke.

When the smoke cleared it revealed three coughing children. "You used cough too much cough Konohamaru-kun."

"Aww Shut it cough Udon!"

The three straitened themselves up and glared at the older boy before them.

"Hey, Boss, you managed to see through my disguise, just as I would expect from the person I consider to be my rival."

Sakura was trying to process that. _'Boss…Rival…That's the Thirds grandson…'_

Naruto just chuckled at their antics. "Well it wasn't hard. Rocks aren't generally square, nor do they follow you down the street."

"Yea yea, hey you promised you'd play ninja with us today!"

Sakura completely forgot about her earlier thoughts. "A ninja, 'playing ninja'?"

The three kids all looked at her as if just noticing her presence. "Hey Boss is she you're… this?" Konohamaru held up his pinky.

"WHAT?!...No no no no, As if I would…" he words died in his throat and all color drained from his face, as he heard the distinct sound of cracking knuckles. Slowly he turned around to see Sakura slowly walking towards him. Her eyes promised a lot of pain.

"BAKA! You'd be lucky to even think of me like that!" Naruto couldn't make heads or tails out of what she was saying, but decided he'd live longer if he just left it alone. Konohamaru, however, had no such survival instincts, and so called out after her as she was walking away.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean you HAG?!"

Sakura stopped short and her head seemed to rotate without her body moving. She made eye contact with the boy, and in those green eyes he saw his own brutal death.

Naruto crept right up next to the kid's ear. "…run…"

They both took off running in the opposite direction of the pink haired kunoichi who was now chasing them. As they rounded a corner, Konohamaru started to pull ahead of Naruto and as a result, crashed headlong into an older boy wearing black.

"Oww, hey brat that hurt."

The ninja picked the child off the ground and held him in the air by his shirt. Naruto stepped up next to them. "Hey we're sorry, about that, but could you please put him down? You're hurting him."

"Not nearly as much as I'm going too." He pulled his fist back and prepared to strike the terrified academy student, despite the warnings of his female teammate. Naruto threw out his hands and attached thick chakra strings to the foreign ninja's arms, effectively holding them in place.

Naruto twitched his fingers, and Konohamaru fell to the floor, and scurried back to his two friends. _'Ch…chakra Strings?!'_

Naruto released the strings, and started to usher the kids away.

The older Gennin started forward, gritting his teeth, and reaching for the large bundle on his back. He pulled his hand back however when it was hit hard, with a small stone.

"It's a very bad idea to attack the Hokage's grandson like that, an even worse idea to attack my team." All eyes looked up, following the stones path to see Sasuke sitting in a tree.

Kankuro had been halted in his tracks twice now; it was enough to send him over the edge of reason. "Like I care who they are, I'll take on all of you at once!"

"Stop it Kankuro." Sasuke's eyes widened as he turned around to see a red haired youth upside down behind him. _'I never sensed him, when did he…'_

The boy vanished in a swirl of sand and appeared between the leaf nin and his now terrified teammate. "If you embarrass the Sand like this again, I'll kill you."

Naruto looked at them sharply, his eyes going wide with apprehension. _'Sand…they're from Suna…Chiyo-sensei…'_

The red heads voice was even and calm, but they way the larger nin reacted one would think someone had plunged a kunai into his back.

"Sasuke leapt down to join the others. "What are foreign ninja doing in Konoha?"

It was the blonde Kunoichi who responded, by holding up a sheet of paper. "We're here for the Chunnin Exam, but kids like you probably wouldn't know anything about…"

"Actually," interrupted Sakura, "we're also entered."

The blonde gave her a quick once over, before dismissing her as the fan-girl she was.

During the whole exchange Sasuke hadn't taken his eyes off the red head. "Hey what's you're name?" "I'm Temar…" Not you, the one with the gourd."

"It is customary to give your name first."

Sasuke smirked. "Uchiha Sasuke"

"I am Sabaku no Garra. I will surely kill you in the exam, Uchiha Sasuke."

Garra led the foreign ninja away, but Kankouro hesitated and turned back to Naruto. "I'm Sabaku no Kankuro, what's you're name?"

"Uzumaki Naruto."

"Uzumaki Naruto…" he nodded. "…and interesting technique you have there."

With that he too turned and walked away.

The boy's just stood and looked after them for a minute, before the silence was broken by Sakura.

"Hey, doesn't anyone want to know my name?"

Konohamaru didn't miss a beat. "No."

The pink haired kunoichi punched him on the back of the head and started walking away.

Naruto forgot them all as he approached Sasuke. "Ne, there's going to be some strong competition in this exam huh Teme?"

The boy nodded before smiling. "Yea, you'd better go train. It's going to take more than your _dolls_ to make through this Dobe."

To his surprise Naruto didn't rise to the bait. He simply nodded and walked off towards his apartment. With the arrival of the Sand Gennin, these exams were becoming bigger for him by the second. _'Chiyo-sensei…'_

_Ok so here's chapter 8...i wsn't too happy with it, even after a few rewrites, so i've waited until chapter 9 was nearly done so i could post them both. _

_With regard to some reviews i've been getting lately. I know that i've been following the Cannon story line pretty closely up till now, the reason for this is that when i began envisioning this story it was prety musch all either during or post exams, a few events aside, however i couldn't just start him at the exams with puppets and i really didn't want to tell the back story through flashbacks. So in essence the other chapters wee, for me, filler chapters setting up the rest of the story which is going to deviate greatly from cannon with inceaseing frequency. Major events might still take place, but only remotely, and possibly to other characters. _

_I don't mind any negative critisism, please continue to review and i promise the next chapter will have a few suprises._


	9. Chapter 9

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 9:

Two days following their encounter with the team from Suna, Team 7 arrived at the academy. Naruto had Kyu out and walking with them, as was becoming his habit. He was now able to fully control the small puppet with only three fingers, it was like all of his puppets were becoming a part of him, an extension of his will. Besides, Kyu was giving him something to focus on other than how nervous he was.

Eventually they came upon a large group of Gennin, standing before room 302. The room they were supposed to go into. There was two older Gennin blocking the door as a boy in green spandex tried unsuccessfully to get by.

Naruto and Sasuke took a step towards the group and Sakura spoke up. "Wait…that's a Genjutsu. It can't be the right room, we're only on the second floor. Besides, I don't think those two are really Gennin." Her voice was barely above a whisper, just loud enough for them to hear her.

Sasuke examined the two closer and activated his Sharringan, to his sight he could see them as they really were, two older ninja, wearing the flack vests of Chunnin.

"You're right they're not. This must be some kind of test. Weeding out the weaklings."

"So…do we blow their cover or just move on?" Naruto, for his part, was sort of hoping that they decided to break up their ruse.

"Let's just go. If they keep more teams from entering, then it'll be easier for us in the long run." Sasuke led them up the next flight of stairs and they found Kakashi leaning against the wall, Zabuza's sword on his back and orange book in his hand.

The Jounin took a moment to wish them luck before walking back down the way they had come.

The team entered the room of the exam and took a place in the back corner near the door, so they could get a good look at whoever else came in. Shortly, those same doors opened and in walked some familiar faces. "Ohh man, you guys are taking this thing too?" The laziest gennin of their graduating class walked over after seeing them, and his blonde teammate rushed strait at Sasuke, who only looked at her as if deciding where to put his kunai to inflict maximum pain. As the girl tried to glomp him he reacted by replacing himself with Sakura. The two girls began yelling at one another, and the two were soon forgotten as the last of their old classmates walked into the room.

Naruto, having seen Kiba enter the room with his dog on his head, decided it way past due for him to annoy their bestial friend. He quickly had Kyu hop onto his own head and stepped up to Kiba's side. He then began to mimic everything the boy was doing. After Kiba shouted for him to knock it off, he addressed the fox that had just leapt to the floor.

"So when did you pick up that thing anyway?"

Naruto smirked as he realized that Kiba thought his puppet was real. "Ohh Kyu? I've had him for a while now."

Kiba smirked. "Figures the Dead last would need an animal to fight for him, after playing with dolls throughout the whole time at the academy."

The 'doll' comment caused Naruto to emit a low growl. "You're one to talk, Mutt."

"Hey Akamaru is my friend and partner. We fight together, besides that's what my clan does. You're just trying to rip off our style because yours was lame."

Naruto clenched a fist, and was ready to show the dog boy just how lame his puppets were, when a gennin with white hair and glasses, much older than them, walked up.

"You guys might want to keep it down, you're attracting a lot of unnecessary attention as it is." When all of the rookies looked around the room they found that a lot of people were glaring at them.

Ino however ignored all them in favor of directing her next comment towards him. "Aren't you kind of old to be a Gennin?" This brought a few snickers from Naruto and Kiba. However the older boy just smiled sheepishly.

"Yea, I guess I am at that, after all this is my seventh time taking this exam. My names Kabuto." A few of the rookies openly gawked at him and several of the other participants started laughing at him. All of this was ignored.

"So if you guys have any questions let me know, I've gathered information on just about everyone taking the test."

This got their attention. Sasuke stepped forward and asked about Garra. Kabuto drew out an information card and charged it with chakra. "Lets see, Sabaku-no-Garra…23 c rank missions…2 B rank…and even an A rank…It says here that he's never been injured during any of them." Naruto turned his focus on the team from Suna, He was about to ask for some information on Garra's teammate, when Kiba beat him to the punch.

"Hey I know, tell us about the Dead last. We can always use a good laugh." The blonde Turned to glare at him, and was surprised when Kabuto came up with a card on him.

"Uzumaki Naruto…It says…" The card was quickly snatched from his hand by a small fox as it leapt through the air. The fox came to sit at Naruto's feet and the blond took the card from it's mouth.

'_He got my card without knowing my name…' _As he read over the information contained on him, his eyes widened and he focused his gaze back on Kabuto as he ripped his card in half and stuffed the two pieces into his pocket. Before he could say anything else to him, the proctors appeared in a loud puff of smoke.

"All right kids break it up and sit down in your assigned seats. The first test of the Chunnin selection exams are about to begin."

Naruto swallowed his emotions for the moment and found his seat, right next to his shy classmate, Hinata, however he was far too distracted to pay her any mind. _'How could he possibly know all that? The Old mans law is supposed to keep anyone from talking about the Fox…and my techniques? It's not like it's a big secret, but how could he know about sensei…' _Naruto's thoughts continued along those lines, until the examiner cleared his throat for attention. Naruto resolved himself to get to the bottom of it, but for now he had to concentrate on the exam.

After listening to Ibiki go through the rules, Naruto jut sat looking over his paper. He hated written tests, always had. It was a part of the reason he did so poorly in the academy, though the fact that he cut class a lot to go practice with his marionette probably didn't help any.

The questions on this test were, to put it mildly, insane. There was no way he could answer them all correctly, let alone enough of them to pass. To his right, he noticed that Hinata was writing furiously, however she wasn't looking at her paper, at least not directly at it, it was hard to tell with her, because her eyes didn't have any iris, just a blank off-white space. At first he thought that the poor girl was blind, then found out that it was just the way her clan was. Now though, her eyes were surrounded by bulging veins. Down farther in the room he could see another Hyuga, a boy, doing the same, with similar veins, though more pronounced, and he realized they were cheating. Somehow they were using their eyes to cheat. Now that he looked, discreetly, around he could see several people doing much the same thing, though in different ways.

Just a row behind him he could hear some muffled yips, probably from Kiba and Akamaru. The puppy had been sitting on his head, so maybe he was looking at the tests around him and giving them to the dog user. _'Not a bad idea, Mutt…'_

"Number 22, you fail, take you're team and get out." Down in the front of the room, a gennin protested, loudly about the unfairness of the test. Naruto used the distraction to Move Kyu from his lap, where it had been sitting, to his shoulder, slipping the small screen out of his pouch at the same time.

Kyu began to look around the room, and Naruto could focus the image on the screen onto the tests around him. The angle wasn't the best, but he was able to get enough answers from the surrounding gennin, to fill out the whole thing.

After finishing, he flipped his paper face down, and put his head down onto his arms, to go to 'sleep'. The position gave him the freedom to continue to watch the others on his screen. All around him Chunnin hopefuls were being eliminated from the test. To the rear of the room, one of the Sand ninja had asked to go to the bathroom, and was escorted out by a rather unusual looking Chunnin.

A short while later he came back thanking the Chunnin for escorting him, when Ibiki shouted up from the front.

"OK, I think we've had quite enough of the puppet show."

Naruto's head shot up, his mouth hanging open. _'Ho…how did…'_ Naruto sheepishly let the fox hop into his lap again, where it curled up and went to 'sleep', never even realizing that the comment hadn't been directed at him.

Ibiki called everyone to stop writing, and announced the tenth question.

The room seemed to close in on Naruto, there was a heavy weight settling down on him, urging him to quit, after all, he could always take it again next time._ 'wait…this feeling,'_

Images began to flash in his minds eye of his team standing guard around an old man, the area covered in mist.

'_that's right…Zabuza did something like this…fear stimulus…killing intent…The proctors are directing it at us…' SLAM _Naruto brought his hand down in the table he was sitting at scaring the white eyed girl into a near unconscious state.

"Cut the crap, my teams experienced worse Killing intent than this…Just give us the question already. Besides if I do fail, I'll still become Hokage, even if I remain a gennin until that day. And, when I do become Hokage…I'm going to demote you to the rank of Gennin, just for threatening us. Might do you some good to take D-rank missions."

The room was stunned into silence, Ibiki leveled the full power of his killing intent at the boy, and he didn't even respond to it. _'Who is this kid?' _

He looked around at the other examinees and saw that a lot of them had small smiles on their faces. Naruto had completely defused the pressure that he had been purposely building since they entered the room. A look to the other proctors confirmed that no one else was going to quit.

He broke into a large smile, finally, Naruto was feeling scared. "Congratulations to those of you left, you just passed the first test of the Chunnin selection exams."

Naruto was kicking himself. After a lengthy discussion about the test and it's true purpose, he realized that, after all those years in the academy, sleeping through tests, he had finally found one that he could have slept through and actually passed. But no he had to go and put in the effort to get the answers.

Currently they were being led towards one of the larger training grounds of the village. Naruto looked around them as they approached. The large forest was surrounded by a high fence, on which had been put a multitude of warnings.

'_An A-rank training field…' _

Their proctor was a woman that Naruto recognized as a Kunoichi he had briefly considered using as a model for his Kunoichi puppet, though he inevitably decided to go with someone else, she was just way to freaky for him, and quite frankly, had scared the crap out of him.

"Welcome to training ground 43, otherwise known as The Forest of Death."

Naruto looked at the forest again. "It doesn't look that bad…" A kunai slipped passed his cheek, drawing a little blood. Before he could react, Anko was behind him with another Kunai pressed against his neck and one arm wrapped around his midsection, effectively pinning him against her.

"You know the loud ones are usually the first to die in there."

She felt a light weight settle on her shoulder, as a sharp piece of metal rested against _her_ neck. She turned her head slightly to see a small fox holding the kunai she had thrown in it's mouth. It was standing on both of their shoulders in such a way that if she moved or did something that caused it to lose its footing, the knife would cut her.

Naruto smirked.

"I think you dropped this."

His smirk turned to shock, a moment later as he felt her lick the small trail of blood that had escaped his small wound.

"Thanks." She took the Kunai from the fox and walked back to the front of the group.

'_Note to self…Stay the HELL away from freaky chicks in trench coats!!'_

Like the rules for the first test, these _seemed_ to be fairly strait forward, just get a scroll, opposite the one you were given and make it to the tower by the time limit. Naruto didn't buy it… the members of team seven were standing by their assigned gate trying to come up with the trick, if there was one, to this test. After a few minutes they concluded that there was no 'underneath' to look under, and turned their thoughts to the problem of getting an earth scroll.

The first thing he had done after getting theirs, while they were still behind the curtain, was to seal their heaven scroll into Kyu's storage scroll to safe guard it. That brought them back to find an earth scroll. They didn't know which teams were carrying them, and when Naruto had tried to use Kyu's cameras to see when they got them, one of the Chunnin Proctors had chased it off.

The exam started and all of the teams rushed into the Forest, Naruto however stopped after only a few yards. His team halted a few feet in front of him.

"Naruto…what are you doing?" Sakura was nervous and it showed in her strained voice.

"It's a pretty safe bet that the best thing to do is to get as afar away from the starting gate as possible right?"

Sasuke grunted. "Right, so lets go already Dobe."

Naruto didn't move. "If that's the best thing to do in this situation, then all of the other teams are probably doing that as well right?"

Now they were getting confused. "I…guess…"

Naruto began looking back at the gate, then to either side of it. "So if we moved along the fence we could probably get behind one of the other teams…"

Realization dawned on them, and the three of them took off along the chain fence that surrounded the outermost perimeter of the forest. They soon came upon the next gate. They saw leading right from the start, outside the gate, that the ground had been disturbed by the hasty advance of another team. The trail led right into the forest strait off from the starting point.

"That way, they'd only be five minutes ahead of us." Sasuke led them off in the same direction. The trail was clear, and easy to follow. "They must not think it matters to cover their tracks. Probably don't think anyone would be following them."

Sasuke had to admit that Naruto had come up with a decent idea. Not that he would tell him so. The Dobe had been getting a lot stronger lately, at this point, he wasn't entirely positive that he could beat him in a fight. That fact scared, and enraged him. If he couldn't beat the class dead last, how could he beat his brother.

They found the team they were following huddling down in some brush just off of the trail. Team 7 had taken to the trees, early so if they did find them, they would have height on them, or if the other team was in the trees as well, so they would be on equal footing. Either way the other team was stupid for staying on the ground. This team was all dressed alike in what almost looked like beige diving suits, complete with breathing masks on their mouths.

They had their backs to them and were sitting so they could look in every direction, except the one they had come from.

Naruto smirked. _Too easy…_

Naruto sent Kyu down to the forest floor and had it circle around their targets. While, at the same time, giving Blade to a clone. He brought Kyu running out of the trees strait at the group, and over the small microphone in the fox's ears he could hear them mutter their confusion, that a small fox kit would be rushing them.

The one in the middle took a kunai in hand and threw it at Kyu, only for the small fox to ignore the 'wound' it received to it's chest.

Their confusion grew and now two began to throw Kunai at it, while the third began a few hand seals. They were so preoccupied, that they didn't notice the cloaked figure falling from the trees behind them. It's mouth opened and it spewed out senbon at them catching two, the one doing the seals and the one in the middle, across their backs. The third leapt away from the assault, right into Kyu, who caught him with a drugged senbon, sticking out of its mouth.

Team 7 approached the downed team from the rain village, and proceeded to search them for their scroll. It was Sakura who found it in the pouch of the one Kyu had taken down.

"Hey Guys, I found it." She ran back over to them holding out the white scroll.

Sasuke took it from her. "A heaven scroll…figures, all that showing off for nothing Dobe."

Naruto didn't take the bait like he thought he would. "Aww come on it was fun, besides, now we have an extra just in case."

Sasuke put the scroll in his hip pouch with a grunt, and the three moved off into the woods to look for their next target.

"AARRRGGG!! What the hell!! This is the fourth Heaven Scroll we've gotten in a row!!" Naruto was feeling more frustrated than he could ever remember feeling before.

Since they defeated the rain team, they had attempted two more ambushes, and had been ambushed once. They managed to defeat all three teams and had taken all three of their Heaven Scrolls. The team was sitting in a thick concentration of branches, almost at the top of the canopy. After tying down some other smaller branches they had made themselves a natural, leafy, cave of sorts.

It was now the second day of the exam, and they each carried a scroll in their pouches, as well as the one hidden in Kyu's scroll.

"Well, if you had just listened to me yesterday, we might already be done with this test."

Naruto wheeled around to glare at the dark-haired boy with a finger pointed directly at him.

"Listen Teme, I'm not going to say it again! We are _NOT_ going to attack our friends, just to pass a test!" He folded his legs and sat down with a huff. "Besides, there was no guarantee that Kiba's team had the right scroll."

Sakura had tuned out their argument a while ago, and was wishing they would stop. He attention was drawn by the surrounding leaves, which were moving more violently now then they had been a few moments ago. _'Strong wind…'_

"Uhh, hey guys…"

"We're going to fail this exam all because of your stupid weakness for your friends."

"They're your friends too jackass."

"…guys…" The wind had picked up a roaring howl.

"Look Dobe, I don't need losers like them, or showoffs like you for that matter."

"Why you stupid stuck up pain in the…"

"GUYS!!"

The two turned to look at their teammate and finally noticed the wind just as a particularly strong gust tore through their hideout, scattering them.

Naruto was flung away into the darkness of the surrounding forest, as Sakura and Sasuke managed to find something to hold onto until the wind finally died down.

"What was that? An attack?" Sasuke started looking around them, but couldn't sense anyone around them. The stiffened suddenly.

"Ku ku ku ku. So there you are, Sasuke-kun. I've been looking for you.

The leaf gennin looked up in time to see a figure 'grow' out of a thick branch above them. The feeling they got from him was worse then what they'd experienced during the first exam and from Zabuza combined.

"Didn't your mother ever teach you that it's not nice to keep someone waiting."

Sakura dropped to her knees, as her life and death flashed before her eyes. _'What happened to Naruto…'_

The orange clad boy fell through the thick branches picking up momentum as he dropped. Naruto spread out his arms and attached Chakra Strings to several branches to slow himself down. Finally he was able to land safely on a branch just above the ground.

He sat down and breathed a sigh of relief, until his branch started moving.

A large head picked itself up off and glared down at him with reptilian eyes.

'_That is a big snake…'_

The head reared back and lunged at him with frightening speed, Naruto rolled off it's back and fell to the ground unsealing blade while he moved. As he stood to face the serpent, he subconsciously realized that he had lost Kyu.

The snake lunged again, and Naruto had to replace himself with his puppet to avoid it. The Sakes mouth closed around the wooden creation and it lifted it's head again to look for the boy as it tried to swallow Blade. Naruto could still feel the puppet on the Strings that were still attached to it. He smiled tightly and spread his fingers wide. Four sword like weapons shot outward from just behind the snakes head, in different directions. The wounded serpent opened his mouth wide in a loud hiss of pain. Not one to like seeing another creature in pain, Naruto began a circular motion with his hands and the swords began to spin in a counter clockwise rotation. Within moments, the snakes head fell to the ground as it's body thrashed around before it too fell motionless.

Blade fell right behind the head and Naruto called it back to him. It's cloak was torn, and shredded, giving it an almost ghoul-like appearance. Naruto sort of liked it, it was still long enough to hide the puppets limbs but now it looked more frightening.

He resealed his puppet and took off back into the canopy to look for his team.

Sasuke was growing too tired to move, the Grass ninja, there was no way he was a gennin, had been brutal in his attacks. The ninja kept on ranting about how his schedule was thrown off because of all the time he wasted looking for them. Sasuke had no idea what he was talking about, but he had shown them that he had an Earth Scroll, so He couldn't run, Not if he wanted to pass this exam and get stronger.

He looked over to where Sakura sat huddled behind the trunk of a tree, she was breathing harder than he was, the look in her eyes held more fear then any he had felt when he had faced Him as a child.

"Come, come, Sasuke-kun, show me your true power already. Don't tell me I'm wasting my time with you. Maybe I should just go after your brother after all."

The comment froze he blood. _'Itachi…' _

His fist clenched, and he launched himself out of his hiding place, despite the screams of his teammate.

The enraged boy threw a powerful series of kicks at the Grass nin, none of which connected. Sasuke took an exploding tag and dropped it next to him as he was tossed aside.

The tag went off and as the smoke cleared, the grass nin was still standing, the damage to his face, not seeming to bother him at all.

He began to laugh again, and pulled off the dead skin covering his features to reveal a much older face.

"I do think I touched a nerve. Is your brother a sore subject?"

The enraged boy continued to attack the strange ninja with a reckless abandon. Finally Sasuke launched himself into the air and came down with a punishing axe kick, to the man's head, which was caught. The man had a hold of the boy's leg and prepared to throw him into the trunk of a tree, when he felt Sasuke burry a Kunai into his neck. As the grip on his foot loosened, Sasuke planted his other on the ninjas chest and pushed off and away from him, flying through hand seals all the while.

As he landed He placed his hand in front of his face and exhaled a large breath of flame.

"Katon: Karyu Endan No Jutsu!"

The flame took on the form of a dragon and barreled into the ninja, pushing him back up against a tree. When the flames died. The lifeless body of their opponent collapsed against the blackened scorched wood and collapsed into a small pile of mud.

He stared at the spot with wide red eyes, his Sharringan swirling madly. He could not believe that he was fighting a clone this whole time.

"Now that's more like it."

He turned to see the Ninja standing atop of a rather large snake. Sasuke was out of breath and low on chakra. He knew that he wouldn't be able to defeat this opponent. He thought about offering up the scroll he carried, since they had extras anyway, but didn't think the man would go for it. He obviously wasn't a Gennin, and even if he was, No body who was only interested in the exam would know his brother like he seemed to.

"Who are you and what do you know about Itachi?"

The man laughed. "More than you obviously. As for who I am…that is a conversation we'll enjoy another time Sasuke-kun. For now I'll leave you with a gift." The snake-like man flew through hand seals so fast even his Sharingan had difficulty following. His neck began to stretch and it shot towards him, He tried to move, however the mans eyes were locked onto his and he found himself unable to move or even look away.

His Mouth opened to reveal two sharp elongated fangs, and Sasuke knew he intended to bite him. the man was brought up short however when an arrow embedded itself with a thud just missing his head by a hairs breadth.

The man looked around, anger apparent on his face. "Leave my Teammates alone!"

Sasuke was confused, the voice was feminine, but Sakura was the only female on their team, and she looked just as confused as he was. Belatedly he realized that he was no longer held by their enemies gaze and leaped backward, putting some more distance between them. At the movement The Sake user looked back at Sasuke with narrowing eyes, like he was going to continue his attack, and had to move away as two more arrows almost hit his head. He followed their trajectory, and spotted a young blonde Kunoichi standing on a high branch with a loaded bow pointed right at him.

His head tilted to the side as he considered her for a moment. "My, my, does your mother know you go out in public dressed like that?" He indicated her less than modest attire.

The only answer he got in return was another arrow fired right him. He pulled his head back to his body and leapt off the snake in time to dodge still more of the projectiles.

The snake he had been standing on lunged towards her and she had to jump away from her perch, firing arrows into the serpents head as she fell. Her decent was halted suddenly as she was caught by the outstretched hand of the sake nin. He brought her close and his eyes widened in realization. He tightened his grip on her neck and her head popped off in a flurry of splinters.

He dropped the remains and had to duck as a cloaked figure flew over him taking a swipe at him with his swords. The figure turned in midair and came flying back at him shooting out Senbon and preparing to try another swipe with his bladed limbs. The needles never found their mark as the giant snake, now wearing a crown of arrows, curled itself, protectively around it's master. The senbon imbedded themselves into it's hide and after a few moments the snake dropped away into the darkness of the trees below, flailing limply as the paralyzing toxin took hold. The leaf gennin were all relieved to see that the ninja wasn't where he stood a moment before, thinking that he was dragged down with his snake.

Sakura rushed from where she was hiding to the side of her crush, reaching into her pouch for her med-kit, while Naruto dropped from where he had been hiding, to collect the remains of his Kunoichi puppet. "What the hell was that all about Teme?"

The boy was currently staring at nothing, his eyes wide and unfocused. _'Again…he did it again…he drove off that ninja, and I couldn't do a thing to him…'_

After he put away his two puppets, Naruto began wondering where he could have lost Kyu. He looked up at where their hide away had been, now just a pile of snapped and broken branched wedged into another branch five feet from it's original position, and began to look around the area. Off to the side of the area they had been fighting he caught sight of a patch of reddish orange amongst the vivid green of the leaves.

He walked over to it and found his small fox puppet wedged into the crook of two intersecting branches.

After he managed to get it untangled, he saw that one of it's legs was at an odd angle, and it's fur was torn in a few places, he also noticed that some of it's inner components were rattling around inside it's body. He shook his head in dismay. _'ohh man this is going to take a while to fix.'_

As he stuffed his puppet into his hip pouch, he happened to look into the thick foliage directly in front of him, as his eyes caught some slight movement, and he found himself looking directly into a smiling white face with yellow eyes.

Naruto's eyes widened in recognition, and he tried to leap back but was caught as a long tongue lashed out and wrapped around his neck, cutting off the boy's air. Naruto's strangled gasps alerted his two teammates and they got to their feet rapidly, their faces twisted into looks of horror as the grass ninja stepped out onto the branch.

The ninja was looking the boy over. "Kukuku, interesting I wasn't aware that Konoha had any of Suna's Doll Users. You have some skill, I'll give you that…some but not much."

As the man mocked Naruto, The boy could feel his own anger rise, this ninja was making a fool of him, he could feel a familiar heat begin to spread throughout his body, and knew that he was beginning to tap into the Fox's chakra.

The Snake ninja holding him smiled with the same realization, even around his tongue. The look on his face was something akin to glee. "Ohh this is too rich. I know who you are. To think that Namikaze's Legacy, is using the technique of another village. There's a good deal of Irony there, Boy." He reached out and took a hold of the boys jacket and tore away the front of it, along with his shirt, to reveal a complicated seal on his stomach. Naruto began to call on more of the demonic chakra, even as His opponent began a few hand seals. "Now, Now, none of that." A dark flame appeared on each of his fingers and he thrust them into his stomach.

Naruto let out a feral scream, felt his chakra begin to ebb away, as if someone had just shut off a valve inside him. The snake man dropped him to the ground and turned his attention to his original target.

"OK, where were we Sasuke-kun." The boy pushed Sakura aside, and almost off the branch, as he tossed a few shuriken at the man, who sidestepped them and caught the wires that were attached to them. He yanked on them and pulled Sasuke forward. The man caught him by the neck with his left hand and held him up in front of him like he had just been doing to Naruto. "I'm sorry Sasuke-kun. I just don't have the patients anymore." With that he crushed the child to him and sank his teeth into his shoulder. As he pulled away, he left a strange mark next to the bite wound.

Sasuke was screaming bloody murder, and writhing on the ground after he was released. The ninja gave the girl a once over and turned to leave, dismissing her as he went when he felt someone grab his ankle, and a small prick just above that. He looked down to see the blond boy with a Senbon embedded into his leg. He looked down on him in amusement. "Well that is impressive, not many gennin could stay awake after having their chakra sealed away like that." He glanced at the Senbon. "Is that a poison? Humph, still trying to kill me…" He was about to walk away, when Sakura called out to him. "What have you done to Sasuke-Kun!?" She was cradling his head in her lap, and dripping tears on him, but he was still obviously in pain, even though he had lost consciousness.

"I gave him a gift. If he survives, he will come to me for more power. My Name is Orochimaru. Tell him for me would you?"

With a maniacal laughter resonating throughout the area, the Sake Ninja dissolved into a small pile of mud.

Following their encounter with Orochimaru, Sakura had done everything she could medically for her team, but her knowledge was still pretty lacking. The pain in Naruto's stomach had eased somewhat, but Sakura had absolutely no idea how to unseal his 'bloodline'. Sasuke was still unconscious, and was being carried/dragged, through the trees to a location Sakura had found while scouting ahead of them. It wasn't much, but they could rest easier than they could out in the open. The spot they were looking for was a large hole in the trunk of a tree, located about thirteen feet off the ground and just under a large tree limb, so it would be out of the view of anyone traveling through the trees.

As they sat down panting, Sasuke was caught in another fit of convulsions. He writhed on the ground gritting his teeth against the pain, and trying to claw at his own neck. Sakura has currently holding him down, and trying to keep the boy from hurting himself.

Once the fit subsided, she fell back out of breath, and placed a warm washcloth on his head, all the while asking nobody in particular; "What did he do to you, Sasuke-kun?"

Naruto's thoughts were along similar lines as he noticed that his chakra control was off. He was trying to control Blade, however was forced to rely on both hands, rather than just the few fingers he was capable of before the fight with Orochimaru.

His shirt was still torn and he looked down at his now visible seal, to see that it had changed. The outer edges of it had a few extra kanji now, and it still hurt like hell. He let Blade sit against the side of their hideout and looked over to his two teammates.

Though his fit has subsided, Sasuke would still cringe in pain every few minutes or so, and he was sweating profusely, as though he was running a high fever.

Sakura wasn't in much better condition, at least mentally. Aside from Naruto's seal being tampered with, which was messing with his chakra control, and whatever it was that Sasuke had on his neck, the team actually received virtually no physical damage, so therefore, Sakura's medical skill, mediocre though they were, were effectively useless. They had tried snapping Sasuke out of whatever was happening to him by disrupting his chakra flow, thinking he might be in some kind of Genjutsu, but to no avail. He would have to wait until they could get him some help.

That brought up a second problem. The only way to get that help was to go to the tower, but without an earth scroll the team would fail the exam. Naruto felt momentary guilt over putting the test before his team, but then he remembered that it was Sasuke. The spoiled Teme would be thinking the same thing, and if they did quit the exam, he'd just get mad when he did recover.

He considered, briefly, going out to try to find an earth scroll by himself, but thought that it would at least have to wait until he'd recovered some of his strength, he could never remember feeling so tired for so long. Usually he'd be fully recovered and ready to go after a couple of hours. Kakashi told him during their wave mission, that it was due to the Fox's Chakra…which was now sealed. Naruto mentally slapped himself for not putting it together sooner.

.

Flashback

"_Ohh this is too rich. I know who you are. To think that Namikaze's Legacy, is using the technique of another village. There's a good deal of Irony there, Boy."_

End

'_Namikaze's Legacy…what did he mean…how did he know about the fox…I thought that the old man ordered it to be kept a secret…there's no way that a foreign ninja should know about me…'_

The thought reminded him of that boy with the white hair from the first exam. He reached into his pouch and took out the torn card he had taken from him.

NAME: UZUMAKE NARUTO

AGE: 11

VILLAGE AFILLIATION: KONOHAGAKURE

CLAN: N/A

KNOWN TECHNIQUES:

PROFICIENT IN THE USE OF PUPPETRY; LEARNED IN SUNA FROM ELDER CHYO

PROFICIENT WITH KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU

OTHER: JINCHURIKI OF KYUBI NO KITSUNE; NINE TAILED DEMON FOX

MISSION REPORTS: S-0

A-0

B-1

C-1 (UPGRADED TO B AFTER MISSION WAS MISLABLED)

D-19

The information went on.

'_A lot of people know about the Fox, who shouldn't.'_

It was suddenly more important that ever for him to get through this test alive, if for no other reason than to tell the Hokage that there might be a spy in the Leaf.

Naruto awoke abruptly when a large concentrated blast of air assaulted their hiding place.

He hadn't even realized that he had fallen asleep. After thinking about all that had happened he began the repairs to his two damaged puppets, and that was the last he remembered.

The tree shook again and he risked a glance out of the opening. Below them were three ninja, all smirking up at them, well two were the third had his face covered in bandages.

"Hey, you, where's the Uchiha? We need to kill him."

Naruto heard a gasp from behind him and turned to see Sakura cradling Sasuke's head in her arms.

Naruto groaned to himself, a small part of him wanted to let them have the Teme, but he couldn't let a teammate get killed, no matter how much of a bastard he was.

Naruto took another look at their surroundings. The hollow of the tree that had seemed so perfect yesterday, now felt like a trap. There were no other exits, and if they went out there, they'd be hit by whatever Jutsu was rocking the hell out of the tree.

He glanced at the two behind him and brought his hands together in a hand sign.

Below them the three shinobe were getting impatient. "Ohh c'mon already, just let us kill him so we can move on."

"You're too impatient Zaku, If you keep that up you'll likely just run out of chakra before you even get to them." The girl on their team had long black hair, and was grinning in a superior way at the boy with bushy hair.

"Ha! If they won't come down, then I'll tear that whole tree down around them."

While he was talking however the three Gennin launched themselves out of the hollow, and over the heads of the three sound nin.

They turned to watch them as they fled, Zaku going through a short series of hand seals, and pointing his hands, palm out, in their direction.

"Ohh no you don't. ZANKUHAAAA!"

Two blasts of pressurized air erupted from the small holes in his hands. The attack caught all three of the Leaf gennin and they all exploded in a cloud of smoke.

"W…What the hell!"

The three turned in time to see a cloaked figure falling upon them, with two bladed arms. Zaku and Kin leapt away, but the third Oto-nin, who stood in the middle, was forced to catch the steel weapons on his arm. The impact rang with the sound of metal on metal. He pushed off and took a swipe at the figure, who moved backward, just missing the attack. It stopped in a crouch low to the ground.

"Hehe, You cant dodge, my Melody arm. Even now I'm sure that your eardrums have ruptured. The pain must be excruciating."

"Hey Dosu, If he can't hear you, then why bother gloating?" Zaku had a large smile on his face, being a wise ass was one of his favorite things.

Dosu sweat dropped and took out a Kunai so he could finish off his opponent. As he approached he called out to his other teammate.

"Kin, the others must be still in that tree, finish them quickly."

With his head turned he never saw the 'disabled' figure rise from his crouched position.

Both of his teammates shouted out a warning, and he turned to see his opponent looming over him. Dosu thrust his Kunai into the stomach, to no effect. He raised his eyes up to the figure to see a cold lifeless stare gazing back. Realization dawned on him. His opponent was not human. The cloak that had shrouded his opponent until then, flew up and Dosu felt the pain of the slash, before he could even register the movement.

He fell back clutching his midsection, as the Puppet was revealed. Said puppet leapt up into the air as the signature attack of his other male teammate hit the ground where it stood. The explosion shook him from his stupor, and he retreated farther away.

"Kin, Get them!"

The girl was already leaping from branch to branch, up the tree. She turned briefly at the boy's shout and looked back up at the incoming fist of a girl with pink hair. The punch caught her off guard, and they both fell to the ground.

"You wont touch Sasuke Kun!"

Kin rose to her feet, more dazed by the fall, than the power of the attack. _'That's it?! Man she's weak.'_

'If that's all the strength you can put behind your attacks then this'll be over with quickly."

What followed was a quick brutal pounding by the dark-haired Kunoichi. Sakura was now bloodied, bruised, and left lying on the ground. The other girl took her by the hair and held a Kunai to her throat.

"Hey listen up, either give up the Uchiha, or I'll slit this Fan girls throat!"

The puppet, paused in it's pursuit of Zaku and landed back on the ground.

For a few brief moments, nobody moved. "Hey, you hear me you Leaf bastard?

Just give us the Uchiha, and both you and this girl can go free."

Inside the tree, Naruto was seething. There was no way he could get to the girl in time with Blade. If he even tried then she would kill his teammate.

When he didn't respond he heard a loud scream from below him.

He rushed to the hole and looked down to see the sound Kunoichi kneeling over Sakura with a large fist full of pink hair, her Kunai was still at her neck, and she was smirking up at him.

"Ohh good you're still here. Next time it won't be her hair a rip off, now this is your last chance. Give us the Uchiha."

"Konoha-Daisenpu!!"

A green blur appeared in the clearing and kicked the dark girl away from the wounded Sakura.

Naruto breathed a sigh as he recognized the boy, from earlier in the exam, as a Leaf nin.

When Sakura looked up it was at a green clad form. The spandex would have made her ill had he not just saved her life. He was standing in a taijutsu pose none of them had ever seen before. His rigid body posture spoke of the endless hard work he must have put into learning it.

"I cannot let you harm such a delicate and beautiful flower."

Sakura nearly swooned. His voice conveyed confidence, and his words were elegant and poetic. Not to mention terribly romantic.

Then he turned to look at her and her heart stopped cold. "Don't worry miss. I, Rock Lee, Konoha's handsome devil, shall protect you."

His words went unheard by the stunned girl who couldn't take her eyes off of the two small animals that had become lodged over the boys wide round eyes.

"I see my youthful fires, have left you speechless."

He turned back to the sound nin who now looked at him with a mixture of confusion and laughter.

"I suggest that you leave at once. For I shall not show you any mercy for attempting to harm a fellow Leaf Ninja."

"Mercy this! Zankuuha!"

The large air blasts flew at the green boy, and he was ready to dodge them, until he saw that if he did, the attack would hit the attractive pink haired Kunoichi.

His code of honor wouldn't allow that. He rooted himself in place and braced himself for the attack, arms crossed in front of him. The twin air attacks hit and he was still launched back into the tree, however the attack, was stopped abruptly when Zaku's arms were riddled with Senbon needles, courtesy of the puppet that was now coming at him from above.

"Dammit!"

He managed to leap out of the way as, the puppet hit the ground burying all four of it's limbs in the loose soil.

"That thing is pissing me off!" He preformed his hand seals, and pointed his arms at the puppet, only for them to drop lifelessly to his side as the paralyzing agent on the needles finally took hold. The blast of air he had been holding back suddenly went off and launched him up off of his feet to land in a heap after crashing through the foliage around them.

By this point Dosu knew that they had to withdraw. He had decided to try to placate them with his scroll in exchange for letting them go, after all they already had one extra.

As he reached into his pouch, his hand was frozen cold by a feeling of immense chakra. It was a feeling he was all too familiar with. He looked around frantically. The source was close, too close for his comfort. He was never comfortable as long as those five and been around, this didn't feel quite like any of them…

Naruto smirked to himself as he watched the sound ninja fly off into the trees. It hadn't been entirely on purpose, but it was funny none the less. He lost his smirk, thought, when he felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise, and a feeling creep it's way up his spine. He turned slowly and saw that a strange, dark chakra had begun to encase his fallen teammate. When the boy began to rise Naruto saw that half of his body was covered in flames. For the smallest minute he thought it was some kid of Fire Jutsu, until Sasuke suddenly projected all of the energy outward. Naruto dove for the entrance to the hollow he was in, and only barely managed to get his feet under him in time.

All eyes looked at Sasuke as he emerged from the opening and stood on the tree trunk. He looked around the clearing, taking in everyone, and came to see Sakura, her hair had been cut off and she was obviously injured. Though he didn't much care about the girls wellbeing, the fact that she…the one who always hung back and did nothing…had been fighting, and protecting him infuriated him. He would not let Sakura of all people show him up.

"Sakura…who did that to you?"

Her eyes lit up. Though he was acting strangely and covered with that weird aura, he was finally showing concern for her well being. (At least in her mind.) She looked over at where the other Kunoichi stood, having recovered from the surprise attack by Lee.

Sasuke followed his teammates gaze and was gone in the blink of an eye, It wasn't until she felt his breath on her neck that she realized where he'd gone. She turned as a foot collided with her head and sent her flying back towards the tree and a struggling Lee. Before she could knock him back down she was caught by Sasuke, and held aloft by her throat, with only his one hand. With the other he began punching her in the stomach.

With each impact she let out a strangled cry, and soon even they stopped. She was still awake, but in so much pain that she could no longer react to the vicious beating.

When he failed to even get the satisfying reaction out her any more, he simply began to crush her neck in his grip. Meanwhile Sakura, who at first was thrilled that the boy was trying to fight for her honor, was now shivering in fear of him. Lee was frozen in his place by the un youthful cruelty he was witnessing first hand.

Naruto was watching with a mixture of both of their reactions.(minus the youthfulness) then anger began to overtake him as Sasuke took her arm in his hands and broke it at the elbow, bending her forearm back against the natural angle of the joint, and Sasuke smiled at the scream that followed.

The markings, which had faded to a black tattoo-like pattern, burned brightly again, as if feeding off of the pain and suffering of the sound girl.

Naruto looked to the girls teammates, to see if they would try to stop her torture, they just stood by, with no indication that they even cared. Naruto had had enough.

"SASUKE!! ENOUGH! Knock it off!" The blond was walking towards his teammate, slowly. Not at all sure that this was the best idea. Sasuke didn't even look his way.

"Stay out of this Dobe."

"She may be an enemy, but she's obviously beaten. There is no reason for this. Just let her go."

Now they dark-haired boy looked at him. "Make me."

Naruto's eyes widened at the sheer insanity and bloodlust that was in his now black left eye.

"SASUKE…" Sakura was on her feet, bloody, bruised, and wobbling, toward him now.

She grabbed onto his waist, pleading for him to stop, and he merely looked upon her like some insect he was inclined to step on.

He brought his hand over to her head gently, then slammed her into the ground. She landed hard on her shoulder and Naruto could hear a loud snapping sound as it was dislocated.

That was it, Naruto may not have had any kind of particular relationship with her, but he certainly didn't hate her, she was his teammate. He ran at the Uchiha and threw a kick at him, which was dodged as the boy dropped his earlier plaything.

"Now you want to fight Dobe…fine."

"What kind of person are you. I know she's annoying, but why would you attack your teammate like that! What would Sensei think?" Sasuke gritted his teeth and crouched to attack. Seeing this Naruto took a gamble.

"What would your parents think?"

The effect was immediate. Sasuke lost the edge he had and was momentarily lost in a large ocean of memories from that night. The night when his entire clan was murdered by Itachi. A vision consumed him of their murder…however he realized that it wasn't Itachi covered in blood, but him.

He fell to his knees, and cried out in pain as the markings were driven back into his neck. Naruto approached in time to see that last of them take a shape similar to the Sharingan.

Sasuke bent over his fists resting on the ground as tears fell from his eyes. "Hey…Teme…"

Naruto placed a hand on the boys back and, surprisingly, he didn't flinch away.

"I'm…sorry…"

"Don't worry about it. That snake guy did something to the both of us. We'll get Sensei to look at that mark on you after the test."

The other two sound ninja approached them and picked up Kin as best they could.

"We're not going to bother you anymore, this round. But in the next one anything goes." Dosu and Zaku began to make their way out of the clearing, when Naruto called out after them.

"HEY!! We still beat you, so we'll be taking your scroll."

Dosu stopped and looked back. "If you want. We can't fight back anymore. But all we have is a heaven scroll."

Naruto just looked at them eyes twitching. "GAAAHHH!!"

He turned and stomped off, grumbling about the lack of earth scrolls. When he got back to his team, Sasuke was trying to apologize to Sakura, who was waving it off and trying to tend to her shoulder. It was then that Naruto saw Lee leaning against the tree.

"Ohh, hey thanks for what you did back there."

"My pleasure." He was looking at Sakura, and Sasuke. "She loves him…"

Naruto nodded. "Yea, but hey, don't give up. I think it's really more of a crush."

The strange boy looked at them and a fire was ignited in his eyes. "That's right! The Fires Of My Youth Shall Not Be Extinguished!"

Naruto Sweat dropped. _'Well that was a fast recovery.'_

"Sooo…uh…where's your team?"

Lee dropped his youthful pose. "Huh…Ohh Right my team…"

"Lee."

All eyes turned to the two people who had landed on the ground near them.

The girl stomped right up to him and smacked him upside the head.

"Where the heck did you go? We were all set to head to the tower, then you ran off."

Naruto's eyebrow lifted at the comment.

"I'm sorry Ten-ten. But I heard a scream from over here so I had to investigate."

"Do you realize that if something had happened to you we would have failed the exam."

This came from their third teammate as he walk up near Naruto. He had the same white eyes as Hinata did and Naruto recognized him from the first exam. He seemed to be every bit the brooding bastard that Sasuke was. Out of the three of them Naruto thought he probably had their scroll, not trusting the others to keep them. He smiled.

"Come on we're leaving, now."

The boy turned to leave, and Naruto ran after him. "Hey wait. What's your name?"

Naruto held out his hand to shake his.

Reluctantly after a moment he took it.

"Hyuga Neji."

Naruto pulled him into a large hug. "Thanks a lot for helping us out. We really appreciate it."

The boy stiffened and was about to launch the boy with a Kaiten, when he abruptly let go.

"Well see yaw in the next round."

"Wait." Naruto froze.

The boy was nearly growling. "Your name?"

Naruto deflated and smirked. "You'll find out soon enough."

Naruto went back to his team and together they leapt up into the trees.

Behind Neji, his team was stifling laughter at his expense.

"Let's get on with it."

Team Gai arrived at the Tower without further incident, and once inside they opened their scrolls. There was a puff of smoke, and a proctor appeared before them.

"Congratulations…You all fail."

The three stared at him in shock.

"What do you mean we fail. We have the scrolls and we arrived at the tower before the time limit was up!" Ten-ten was furious.

"You did arrive on time, however you're short one earth scroll." He said pointing to the brown scroll in Neji's hand. He turned it over, while activating his Byakugan, and cursed. He ripped off the brown paper to reveal another Heaven scroll. On the torn off piece was written a message.

'Compliments of Uzumaki Naruto'

Below that was a picture of a fox sticking out its tongue.

"Naruto! I can't believe that after Lee risked his life for us, you stole his teams scroll!"

Sakura had been verbally bashing him since he revealed what he had done.

"And after all of that talk about not attacking other leaf teams, you just…"

When they reached the door, on the opposite side of the tower from the one Neji's team had entered through, Naruto rounded on her stopping her mid-sentence and held up one finger.

"First, what I said was that I didn't want to attack any of our friends from the academy. We barely know Lee and his team, Second (two fingers) That Neji guy, as well as being a complete jerk, is from the Hyuga clan. I'm pretty sure they have a special bloodline similar to the Time's over here. (points thumb in Sasuke's direction) so if they guy couldn't tell that when a perfect stranger hugs him for a reason he had nothing to do with, and swipes their mission objective from them, even with those special eyes of his, he really has no business being promoted to a Chunnin, and would probably get his team killed if he did. So the way I see it, Lee saved your life, and I returned the favor."

Naruto turned again and pushed open the door to the tower.

After they entered the empty room they took out the scrolls and opened them to reveal a summoning scroll. In a puff of smoke they were greeted by none other but their instructor from the academy, Iruka.

He looked like he was about to go into some kind of speech, until he took in the appearance of the three before him. "What happened to you three?!"

Both Sakura and Sasuke remained silent, leaving Naruto to do the talking, as usual.

"Well it's been a crazy couple of days." He cast a sidelong glace at Sasuke. "Uhh, listen Iruka Sensei, do you think that we could talk to Kakashi-sensei?"

Iruka was worried. "Well the teams taking the exam aren't supposed to have any contact with their Sensei's during the first two parts of the exam, but since you've already passed, with a few days to spare, I suppose I could send him a message to meet you in your room. Unfortunately you can't leave the tower until the exam is over, unless you're going to quit?"

Both of the boys gave him a look that made it quite clear they had no intention of quitting.

"No it's nothing like that. There were just some things we encountered during the exam that I need to talk to him about. Maybe the Hokage too, but for now I just want to see what he thinks."

Iruka nodded. "Ok I'll send for him now. In the meantime, you go rest. Ohh and if anyone asks I gave you the speech about that saying on the wall." With that he disappeared the way he came, in smoke, and the three of them went to their room. Once inside Sasuke grabbed Naruto and pushed him up against the wall, causing the boy to drop the damaged fox puppet he had been carrying.

"What are you going to tell Kakashi?"

Naruto glared at the boy. "I'm going to tell him about that snake bastard, and what he did to us."

"You keep this thing on my neck a secret understand? I lost control before and it caught me off guard, but I know that I can control it's power. It made me stronger, faster,…"

"Psychotic."

"Look Dobe, if you say anything…" He was shoved roughly back.

"You'll what Teme?"

"…."

"That Orochimaru guy, was obviously at least Jounin rank. Best case scenario, he infiltrated the exam to help eliminate the competition for his own team. Worst case…I don't even want to try and guess. Either way Sensei needs to know."

It was at that moment that a knock was heard at the door, and Kakashi walked in. Book in hand and Zanbato on his back.

"Yo…" He took in the condition of his team. _'Sakura looks half dead, and they look like they're about to kill one another. Aside from the injuries, nothing unusual.'_

"So what's up?"

The three of them began to relate their experiences from during the exam. When they came to the part about Orochimaru, Kakashi immediately put away his book, confirming to them that, not only did he know who they were talking about, but that it had him worried.

They explained, much to Sasuke's displeasure, about the Curse Mark on his neck, and the seal that was placed over Naruto's 'Bloodline'.

After examining both briefly, Kakashi took Sasuke aside and put an additional seal on his neck, in order to keep the Mark in check. Unfortunately the seal on Naruto was beyond his abilities to remove, and promised to find someone who could remove it safely. Naruto just shrugged, after all it made it more difficult for him to use his own chakra, but not impossible. Lastly, Sakura described their encounter with the Sound Trio, and how they had claimed to have been targeting Sasuke specifically.

After listening to their entire report and asking only a few questions, Kakashi left the room to go report to the Hokage. As he was walking out, Naruto exited the room behind him, and Kakashi stopped.

"Naruto, was there something else?"

"Yea, it may be nothing but…I took this from another Leaf Gennin during the first exam."

He reached into his pocket and handed Kakashi the torn card. The Jounin glance at it briefly and his one visible eye narrowed.

"Who did you get this from?"

"I think his name was Kabuto, he's an older Gennin, said this was his seventh time taking the exam. He also claimed to have information like this on everyone in the exam, even foreign teams."

Kakashi nodded. "Ok, good work, I'll look into this…What else is there?"

Naruto looked down. "That Orochi-guy…He called me…'Namikaze's Legacy'… What did he mean by that?"

It took a minute before Kakashi could answer. "Naruto…That is an answer I can only give you after consulting with the Hokage, as it may not be my place to give it."

Naruto was taken aback, this was a level of emotion, that he was unused to from his Sensei. It was almost unsettling.

"Go on and rest up. You have a few days until this part of the exam is over, afterward you'll likely need it."

He walked a few more steps and vanished.

Naruto went back to their room and, as he had been told two days later they were summoned tot eh main floor of the tower, along with the others who had passed the test. Naruto had used the time to repair his puppets as best he could, but without replacements parts, he was forced to use some of Kunoichi's to fix up the other two, leaving him with only two of the three. Naruto was determined to build a few more the first chance he had.

The Gennin, six teams in all, were lined up in front of a group of people including not only their instructors, and several Chunnin proctors, but the Third Hokage as well. The old man was currently standing in front of the assembled ninja, smiling at the faces he saw.

'_So, all of the rookies made it this far, and practically nobody else…' _He was chuckling to himself.

"I want to congratulate all of you for passing the second part of the Chunnin Selection exam."


	10. Chapter 10

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 10

The members of Team 7 stood in a column, with Sasuke in the front. Naruto was standing behind Sakura, not really paying attention to the speech the Hokage was giving them about the true purpose of the exams, and surveying the remaining teams. It seemed that Neji's team had been eliminated, and Naruto had to suppress a chuckle. The sound team however, had actually made it through the second exam it seemed. _'So they either found an earth scroll somewhere, unlikely given the condition they're in, or they were lying to me when they said that they only had the Heaven.'_

On the other side of where his team was standing, was Kabuto and his team. The three of them looked in pretty good condition, except Kabuto, who was just really dirty, so it surprised him that he started to quit when the new proctor asked if anyone couldn't continue.

'_Ohh no, you don't…'_

Naruto discreetly cast out a couple of near invisible chakra strings, and latched them onto Kabuto's arms, pinning them to his sides. The proctor stared at him for a moment before announcing the next part of the exam would be a short preliminary tournament, to see who advances to the final round.

When Naruto released his strings, Kabuto looked around at everyone, and met the blondes eyes. At the white haired genins unspoken question Naruto simply mouthed. 'You're welcome.'

The teams split off and went up to the spectators area, it was interesting to Naruto to note that Kabuto's team chose to go to the side with the other foreign teams rather than his fellow Leaf Ninja.

On the way up to the waiting area, he overheard a bit of conversation going on between Hinata and Kiba.

"Hey I thought that your cousin was taking the exam? Did he get eliminated?"

Hinata scanned the other side of the room for any sign of Neji's team.

"I..I don't know…"

Naruto couldn't help himself. He started laughing and when the two turned to look at him, he waved them off. "Sorry I was just remembering something that happened during the last test."

Kiba scoffed at him and turned to face forward, while Hinata merely blushed and avoided eye contact.

At this point their attention was drawn to the screen above the Kage and Jonin, as it announced the first match.

**Uchiha Sasuke VS Kinuta Dosu.**

Sasuke calmly walked down the stairs, as Dosu looked on with fear in his eyes. "N..no way, I'm not going to fight that psycho…" He felt a heavy hand on his shoulder and stiffened as he realized who was standing behind him. He met the cold yellow eyes of his 'Sensei' and resigned himself to his fate.

Once both competitors were in position, The proctor, a sickly Jounin named Hayate, began the match.

Dosu began by running strait at Sasuke, who had activated his Sharringan, As the bandaged boy took a swipe at him the Uchiha leapt into the air, before Dosu could even bring his arm around, and began a short series of hand seals. "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu!"

The large fireball hit the ground where the Sound nin had been standing, as he rolled away and came to his feet again. _'Shit! I can't fight from long range!'_

Sasuke threw a few Shuriken at his as he landed, the boy ducked as they thudded down behind him, and Sasuke preformed another Grand Fireball. Dosu tried to roll away again, but was stuck firmly in place. He turned to see a couple of the throwing stars anchoring the fur he wore to the ground.

The Fire ball hit him and he threw his arms up to try and protect his head and body. The heat from the flames actually melted off the Melody arm, and the resulting burns left him twitching on the ground, but alive. The proctor announced Sasuke as the winner while medical teams rushed in to help the burned ninja.

Sasuke returned to the stands to cheers and congratulations, mostly from Sakura and Ino, while the next round was announced.

**Haruno Sakura Vs. Nara Shikamaru **

Sakura was visibly relieved by the match up, and even proclaimed loudly that she wouldn't have any trouble against someone as lazy as Shikamaru. Ino shook her head. "You'd better not underestimate him Forehead."

"Ohh? And why is that Pig? Is he going to Yawn on me or bore me to death?"

Rather than answer, the blonde wheeled on her teammate. "Don't you even think of quitting Shikamaru!"

For his part the laziest student in the academy, simple walked down the stairs to the floor, muttering about how troublesome fan girls were.

When they were set up the proctor began the match, and Sakura wasted no time in throwing several Kunai at Him, only to miss as he bent over backwards at the waist to avoid them.

"Troublesome…"

Sakura took two steps and leapt up into the air to come down on his still prone form. The Nara simple watched her come and twisted away at the last minute, to wind up standing behind her.

"_sigh_ I guess, as a man, I can't lose to you."

A Vein popped out of her head and she spun around with a Kunai in her hand to try to capture him at the neck, but found only air.

She looked down to see him crouched in front of her with his hands folded into a seal. She tried to get away, but her body refused to move.

"Kagemane; success."

Shikamaru hopped backward, with Sakura mimicking his action.

"W…what the hell is going on!" Between them she could see that there was a dark shadow connecting them.

"This is my clan's technique. Our shadows have bonded, and now I can control you through my actions."

To demonstrate he brought up his hand in a fist and held it right next to his own throat. True to his words, she did the same, only in her hand was the Kunai she had been holding.

"Now, just surrender so we can get this troublesome thing over with."

Sakura hesitated. _'He…he's controlling my body like it was one of Naruto's puppets…' _

For some reason she couldn't quite understand, that thought made her seem like she had been violated in some perverse way. A tick began to form in her temple, and she felt white hot rage boiling up in her. _**'CHAA!... Who does this guy think he is?!'**_

Slowly she willed her hand away from her throat, and along with it Shikamaru's also lowered, much to his surprise.

"Troublesome. She has a strong will."

He released the technique and at the sudden lack of resistance she nearly stumbled forward, but recovered and ran at him again. She crossed her fingers in a seal and two other Sakura's appeared next to her.

Shikamaru looked at the three of them and again shot out his Shadow, this time however it split into three and tried to attach to all three of them. this caught her off guard and halted her in her tracks, catching all three. When the two on the left vanished Shikamaru wasted no time in causing her to toss him her Kunai and placing it at her neck, holding her at knife point once again. She also held her hand at his neck, but now it was empty.

'_Dammit, even if I can break out again he can still cut me.'_

The Proctor seemed to mirror her thoughts because he called the fight off and announced Shikamaru the winner.

**Akado Youroi V.S. Sabaku no Temari**

"Finally." The girl lightly hopped down over the railing, and stood waiting as her opponent arrogantly walked down the stairs at a leisurely pace. "Hey c'mon can't you just hurry up already?!"

The masked Leaf ninja simple adjusted his glasses. "Why? You in a hurry to lose?"

Temari gritted her teeth and Hayate began the match. The man ran through some seals before a blue aura appeared around his right hand. Seeing this Temari smirked. '_ohhh a close-range fighter…sucks to be him.'_

Oblivious to the girls thoughts, he ran at her tossing a spread of Kunai before him. To his surprise, she didn't even try to get out of the way. She just took a hold of the large metal object on her back and swung it at the weapons. _'Too soon to block them'_ he thought.

About midway through her swing, she flicked her wrist and the fan she was holding opened, releasing a large gust of wind that not only stopped the Kunai in their tracks, but

Actually sent them spinning end over end back the purple clad nin.

He also found himself caught in the gale, and was thrown back into a wall, followed by his own Kunai, one of which stabbed right into his thigh. He clutched at his leg and fell forward to the ground in pain.

Hayate shook his head at the short duration of the fight and ended it. Akado was in no position to defeat a long range specialist.

**Yamanaka Ino Vs Tushi Kin.**

The two Kunoichi made their way down to the floor, and faced off against each other.

Kin took one look at the girl and laughed. "Is every Kunoichi in the village more worried about their looks than their skills?"

"Don't underestimate me because you're jealous."

Kin's confidence was all for show, they could both see it. Her arm was wrapped in a splint, and her breathing was labored, she was also covered from head to toe in bruises and scrapes.

'_Broken wrist, probably some broken ribs, just what the hell happened to her out there…ohh well easy win for me.'_

Hayate began the match, and they each reached into their hip pouches and threw weapons at one another. Ino's Shuriken collided with Kins senbon in mid air, however the two other senbon few past the blonde girl and hit the ground behind her.

The girls began running around the ring trading throws, as soon as Kin began to run Ino could hear ringing coming from the bells hanging on her belt. "You know those bells can't be good for your stealth." She mocked her hoping to make her angry enough to close for close range combat.

Ino tried to run at her, but the dark haired girl hopped away, refusing to get into the kind of fight that would cost her the match. Ino then took two Kunai and threw them to either side of the girl to stop her movement, she formed a hand seal, looking at the girl through the square she formed with her fingers and preformed her families signature Jutsu.

Up in the stands her team was groaning in frustration at her poor choice of tactics.

"She should know better than that, she can't hit her with that technique without one of us holding her." The large boy Shikamaru was addressing didn't reply.

Kin saw the girl lining up a jutsu of some kind, and tried to jump aside. When she leapt up however, her foot caught on a thin wire attached to the shuriken that the blonde had thrown before. She fell heavily on her injured arm and, cried out in pain.

Ino smirked and redirected her technique at the fallen girl. At the last minute though, she heard bells ringing behind her, and suddenly her vision began to blur, Kin split into three Kin's, and the blondes aim was thrown off as she fired her Jutsu.

Ino slumped to the ground, and there was a tense silence in the air as all waited for the result. Kin was looking around her to try to find what had happened. She struggled to her feet and took out a senbon, thinking the prone girl was playing possum. She threw the needle at the girl and it hit her in the leg, to no visible effect.

To her further confusion, she could here two boys, the blonde's teammates, groan and curse the girls overconfidence. _'I don't know what the hell just happened but I'm not going to complain.' _She took out a Kunai in her good hand and made her way over to the girl as quick as she could. Just after placing it at the immobile girl's neck, she began to stir. She opened her eyes groggily, and looked at the position she was in as Kin was declared the winner.

Kin let her up. "Just what the hell was that supposed to do?"

Ino groaned. "One of my families techniques, It transfers my mind into yours. I was going to force you to quit, but I missed."

Kin just stared at her. _'What the hell good is that technique? Any other opponent should be able to dodge that and kill her easily.'_

The two girls walked back up the stands, and Ino met with a lecture about when to use certain techniques, and underestimating an opponent, while Kin was teased by Zaku about her opponent beating herself for the sound Kunoichi. Had the girl not been so injured, she might have hit him.

**Hyuga Hinata V.S. Zaku Abumi**

Hinata's eyes widened at the sight of her name on the screen. She nervously began to make her way over to the stares, when someone called out to her from behind.

"Oy Hinata…"

She knew that voice, every time she heard it, be began to blush and became short of breath. "N…Naruto-k…kun…"

She turned and he was still looking over at the Genin, as he walked down the stairs on the opposite side. "Watch yourself, he's a long range specialist."

'_H…he's trying to h…help me…'_

"A…arrigato, Naruto-Kun."

After she made her way to where her opponent was standing, he scoffed at her apparent shyness and stood casually with an glint in his eye that she was suddenly a little afraid of.

Zaku lifted his arm to point it at her with his hand in a tight fist. "This is the only chance you'll get from me. Surrender now."

Hinata was visibly shaking, and could feel the eyes of everyone in the room focus on her. _'E…everyone is wa…watching me. Every…one…and so is He…Naruto-kun.'_

She could hear his warning in her mind about the sound ninjas abilities. _'N…Naruto-kun was trying to help me…I…I cannot l…let him down…'_

The small girl steeled what little resolve she had inside her, and focused chakra to her eyes, causing the veins around them to bulge as she whispered the name of her bloodline.

"Heh, don't say I didn't warn you."

With her clans eyes active she could see a large amount of chakra being stored with the arm he held pointing in her direction. _'a…a long range specialist…'_

"_cough_ Begin."

Zaku wasted no time in opening his hand and releasing the maelstrom contained within. The chakra exploded out of a small hole in his palm in a fury of sound and air.

Hinata was expecting something like this but the intensity of the attack caught her off guard and made her hesitate for a second before she threw herself to the side in a wild attempt to avoid the onslaught.

The attack collided with one of the supports holding up the stands were everyone else was watching, causing it to buckle.

Hinata watched eyes wide in horror as her friends all grabbed onto the railing to keep from being thrown off. She could see Naruto glaring down at the boy who was only laughing at their plight.

The boy preformed a few hand seals and pointed both arms at the girl. She watched as the chakra rapidly built up in both of his arms.

"KICK HIS ASS HINATA!!"

The shout from her crush caused her heart to skip a beat and broke her out of her stupor. She jumped high over the attack as it sent floor tiles shattering in different directions.

Hinata knew the best way to fight a long range opponent was to engage them in close range if possible or to get out of their effective range, but in this arena that was out of the question. As soon as she landed she began to run at the boy, and had to dodge as he shifted the attack to try to hit her again.

The young Hyuga heiress came up right in front of him and almost on instinct, drove her fingers into the boy's arms cutting off the attack, and causing him to yelp in pain. He tried to throw a wild kick at her, which she could easily see coming, and she tapped a few locations on his leg as well.

Zaku couldn't figure out what had happened. The girl seemed so weak, but now she'd just done something that made his left arm hurt like hell, and he could barely move his left leg. "…bitch…" He growled out, and gathered a small amount of chakra into this right arm and fired off a small blast directly at the ground between them.

He let the concussive force of the blast carry him back and put some distance between them. He began to rub the numbing pain out of his damaged arm and prepared another Double Zankuha. Hinata saw this and her eyes widened as she focused on the arm she had hit with Juken.

Zaku noticed that it was taking slightly longer to gather the necessary chakra to his left arm, and forced more to the appendage.

Hinata could see it clearly. Her eyes were not as finely attuned as those of her father and cousin, so she could not accurately see the tenketsu, that was fine though because she hadn't been aiming for them, however she could now see the spike of chakra she had driven into his arm lodged into one, just behind his elbow. The chakra he was gathering was having difficulty bypassing it.

"NO…Wait…"

Too late. Zaku opened the holes in his hand to let out the building pressure, and cried aloud as the pressure in his left arm violently tore it's way out of his Tenketsus, nearly severing his arm at the elbow.

The pressure being released from his other arm, caused him to spin around in place as he lost the will to hold it steady, the spin cause several droplets of blood to spray onto Hinata's coat.

The girl stood stock still, the only sounds in the room, were the sobs of her opponent writhing on the floor while trying desperately to hold his arm together. The medics rushed in and took him to the ER.

"Winner Hinata Hyuga."

Both Kiba and Kurennai leapt down from the stands, rushed to the girls side. She was just staring blankly at the blood on her coat, and didn't even react to them as they led her back up to the stands.

As they reached the stairs the board announced the next fight.

"Inuzuka Kiba Vs Uzumaki Naruto."

Shocked Kiba turned to look at the board then at his opponent who was currently jumping down from the balcony. He smirked then turned back to his teammate.

Don't worry Hinata, this won't take long I'll be right back.

Kurennai continued to lead her student up to the rest of the leaf Gennin, however rather than let her rest up against the wall, she supported the girl as they stood near the railing. She knew that Hinata had a crush on the loud boisterous blonde, and thought that watching him fight might help her to snap out of it.

As both fighters met in the center of the ring, Naruto indicated the Hyuga Heiress.

"Hey, mutt, is Hinata ok?"

Kiba looked back over his shoulder, ignoring for the moment the insult. "Yea she'll be ok. But that's not your problem right now." The dog ninja's grin turned absolutely feral.

"I'm going to make this quick." Akamaru barked in agreement from his position at his masters feet.

Naruto had his repaired Kyu hop down from his shoulder and take up a similar position.

Again Kiba smirked. "Wanna let them have a go first? See whose partner will measure up first?"

Naruto had to choke back a laugh. _'He still thinks Kyu is real…ohhh this will be good.'_

"Yea why not. But I'd bet a weeks worth of Ramen that Akamaru won't last long."

"You're on."

Hayate, taking that as a sign to begin the match, did just that, and the two small 'animals' began to circle each other, looking for an opening. Without warning Akamaru leapt at the fox in a tackling lunge. Naruto merely smiled as Kyu's mouth opened and a senbon needle shot out, catching the puppy in his right shoulder.

With a yelp, Akamaru landed just short of the fox sniffing at the needle, and after a few halfhearted, groggy attempts to pull out the offending piece of wood, fell to the ground.

"AKAMARU!!" Kiba rushed forward as Kyu jumped up onto Naruto's shoulder.

The boy cradled his partner in is arms. He was beginning to panic, when he noticed that the dog was breathing comfortably.

"He'll be fine. He's just taking a nap." Kiba looked up sharply at the blonde.

"That needle had a sleeping agent on it. Nothing lethal."

Kiba looked from his partner to the fox. His eyes narrowed in suspicion, then widened in realization as the pieces clicked together in his head.

"Th…that's a puppet?!"

Naruto smiled in pride. "Yep. I designed him to help us hunt the Fire Lord's cat, but he's come in handy a lot since then." Naruto gave the fox a pat on it's head, and if they didn't know better those watching would have sworn that the fox nuzzled back into his hand.

Kakashi shook his head. _'He's getting so used to using that particular puppet that he's controlling it's actions on a subconscious level, and given it a personality as a result. It practically is alive now.'_

Kiba set the small white puppy down on the side of the ring, and got into a ready stance. "Ok then, I'll admit you had me fooled, but it's going to take more than a stuffed animal to beat me, Dead last."

Naruto allowed Kyu to join Akamaru and took the white scroll from it's holder on his thigh. "Bring it on Mutt!"

Before Naruto could act on his challenge Kiba had tossed two small spheres at the ground near his feet. They exploded, and Naruto was caught in a thick purple smoke.

His eyes widened and he held his breath. _'Shit! Poison? No it's odorless, just a smoke screen then.' _Naruto took his scroll in hand and bit his thumb.

From outside of the smoke, Kiba was busy performing Justus. His first cause him to take on a more bestial appearance, and the second cause him to shoot forward at the smoke, while spinning rapidly in fury of claws and fangs. However his attack was cut off as a second explosion, from within, caused the smoke to get blown away.

Before him now stood two tall cloaked figures, and a bit further back, a smirking Naruto. The blonde threw out both hands and the two cloaked figures rushed into two separate directions, The closer of the two jumped up into the air and Kiba had to dodge a swipe from the second as a wide flat blade appeared from under it's cloak.

As Kiba hopped backward again to dodge a follow up swipe, a hail of Senbon came flying at him from above, and he was again forced to retreat, putting distance between himself and Naruto.

Thus far the match was generating quite a stir among the Leaf Gennin, as nobody, other than his won team, had expected the match to go so far into the blonds favor. However they weren't they only ones who was interested in the match. On the other side of the room the large Sand Ninja, Kankuro, was also paying rapt attention.

'_Huh. Ok, I admit, he's not bad, even I have trouble controlling more than one at once. But to remain out in the open like that. He's just asking to be targeted, and since he's not hiding, why bother making his strings so thin? I mean if I didn't know better I'd say that one puppet didn't even have……ohh…ok, he's not bad.'_

Behind him His sensei, Baki, was mirroring his sentiment. _'But where did he learn that technique. Is there a spy in Suna?'_

Down on the floor the two boys had gotten into a steady rhythm of attack and dodge, and Naruto had to admit, to himself anyway, that Kiba was doing a good job of keeping away from his attacks.

Then, in an impressive display of agility, Kiba planted both of his hands and feet onto the chest of the closer of the two and launched himself into a low ark over the arena, The puppets followed as they had been doing thus far, one through the air and one along the ground.

When the bestial Gennin began his decent, he twisted around to face the orange clad boy controlling the puppets, and called out one of his signature Jutsu's. "GATSUGA!!"

He was once again engulfed in a twisting maelstrom of fangs and claws, aimed right at his opponent. The move had caught Naruto so off guard that he hesitated before dodging, and it cost him in the form of a deep slash across his chest and midsection from one of Kiba's elongated claws.

Both boys came to rest on the ground in a crouch next to each other. In a clatter of noise a puppet came to rest at the dog nins feet, as it's controller had lost his concentration and let drop the strings while he was clutching his wound.

Kiba, rather than press his advantage, just looked at him with a confused expression. While he had been making his attack, just for a split second, he saw Naruto smirk.

POOF

The boy before him exploded in a puff of smoke, and realization dawned on him.

'_A clone…they were controlled a clone?! Then where…uggg…'_

The rush of air and the whisper of fabric was all that alerted him to the presence that had come up behind him, that and the cold touch of metal at his neck told him that he had been indeed caught. He glanced over his shoulder into the hooded gaze of lifeless wooden eyes.

For a brief second he almost expected Akamaru to come barreling into his assailent, but remembered that the puppy was already out of commission. His shoulders sagged in defeat and the announcer called the match.

"Winner; Uzumaki Naruto."

Kiba continued to examine the blank stare of the puppet, when it's eyes suddenly moved to return his gaze, and then winked at him. Kiba nearly screamed in shock until the puppet disappeared in a puff of smoke to reveal his opponent triumphantly twirling a Kunai.

Sudden realization settled in on him and he jabbed an accusing finger at the boy. "That puppet was you this whole time?!"

In response Naruto just smiled wider, collected his puppets and walked back towards the stands.

Kakashi, who had actually paid attention to the match, was impressed with the boys strategy. It had even fooled him for a brief time. As the blonde returned to their team, Kyu following along behind, He was met by a barrage of questions from the other Gennin about his puppets. Kiba had also rejoined his team, while cradling Akamaru lovingly in his arms. The dog nin was looking slightly depressed, so Naruto approached him with a hand extended.

"Hey, good match Mutt."

Kiba looked at him for a second, looking for an insult or gloat somewhere in the gesture, but took the offered hand firmly.

"Yea, but I'll get you next time we fight. In the meantime however…" He turned to his female teammate who was still standing near her sensei, but seemed as if she was able to stand on her own again, and was at least conscious of her surroundings. "…hey Hinata…kick his ass for me in the next round ok?"

When she realized just what Kiba had said and not only that were both she and her crush progressing to the next round, but they might have to… well Kurennai, once again had to support the poor girl as the blood rushed to her head.

"Next round; Sabaku no Kankouro vs. Aburame Shino."

The call from the sickly examiner drew the attention of everyone in the room. Naruto in particular had a bad feeling from the large boy. He leaned over the railing and watched closely as the two competitors entered the ring. And the match was begun.

It started simply enough, Kankouro ran at Shino and the leaf nin leapt back, releasing a few Shuriken in the process. What surprised Naruto was that when Kankouro dodged them one of the throwing stars hit him in the leg, and he appeared not to notice it at all. He didn't even flinch, nor was his movement inhibited in anyway.

The match continued like that as Kankouro came within range to throw a few punches at his opponent. All of which were deftly blocked. It was obvious that both boys were holding something back, not wiling to show their opponent until it became necessary.

Naruto was quickly getting bored and was about to turn to his teammates for conversation when he heard Hinata gasp. He looked back at the match to see Kankouro with a Kunai plunged into the chest of their fellow Leaf Gennin. Shino staggered back a few steps and fell forward.

Before he hit the ground however he dissolved into a swarm of bugs. All of which began to crawl up Kankouro arms. The nin began to wave his limbs around trying to dislodge them as Shino stepped out from behind a pillar under the stands. "Kaki Bunshin. My bugs will drain all of your chakra until you lose consciousness. I suggest you surrender now."

Several people in the arena were slightly disturbed to see insects crawling out of the boys skin, but soon focused on the Suna ninja as he stopped flailing around. The bugs had now covered both arms up to his shoulders and were beginning to move over the rest of his body. He smiled and collapsed in a heap. Shino not wanting to kill the boy, called his bugs to a halt. They flew off him and hovered above the body.

Hayate, seeing no signs of movement raised his hand to call the match, until a Kunai shot out of the mass of black clothing, and missed Shino by a small hair. The kikai began to descend on him again, and the white bundle on the boys back started to bulge. Something tore free of the wrapped bundle and was revealed to be Kankouro as he landed on the other side of the ring, in a crouch.

To everyone's shock, the first Kankouro began to get to it's feet and lunged at Shino with both arms, despite the swarm of kikai bugs on it. Shino caught both arms by their wrists and drove them over both of their heads. Using the momentum from the upward motion he stepped in and threw his knee up into the bodies stomach, only for it to be blocked by a third arm, this one not human at all, that had burst from it's side.

A fourth appeared out of the other side, with a thin blade sticking out of it's palm and tried to stab Shino in the stomach. The bug user pushed off 'Kankouro' with his free leg and avoided the attack.

Naruto watched the interaction from his place in the stands, with growing trepidation. After the sand ninja had revealed himself, Naruto realized that he, too, was a puppet user. All of the warnings given to him by Chiyo Ba-sensei were flooding his memory. He couldn't be sure what would happen now that they knew without a doubt that he used one of their techniques. On impulse he looked around for the teams sensei…and found him near the Hokage. His face was half covered with a white cloth and he was talking heatedly with the Third. Every few seconds the two men would look up at him.

Naruto was instantly pulled out of his thoughts when a hand landed on his shoulder. Kakashi bent low over him, as if in answer to some unasked question. "You use a technique that is unique to their village. That Jounin is probably trying to find out where you learned it."

Naruto nodded. "He thinks we stole it." Kakashi's eye smiled. "Or that we have a spy in their village."

He patted the boys shoulder and they turned back to the match that was still going on.

Shino had the Suna Genin backed into a corner. Kankouro had spent the last few minutes trying to avoid the swarm of insects that was flying around them, to only the most limited success. It was becoming more difficult to control his puppet too, which was now fully revealed for what it was.

Shino was standing in the middle of the room, He only had to dodge the rare kunai, that was lobbed at him on impulse. The Suna ninja was too busy trying to stay away from his Kikai. It might take awhile, but the Aburame were nothing if not patient. It would be over soon.

Finally in a last desperate gambit Kankouro stopped moving after putting a little distance between him self and the bugs. In a exaggerated gesture he brought both hands up into the air and his puppet followed suit. The four-armed, shaggy wooden construct halted ten feet above Shino's position. Said Leaf nin was simply looking up at it as it began to spin like a top, it's arms spread out wide. All watchers looked on in confusion until a thick purple gas was ejected from various points on the puppets body. The gas quickly filled the arena while Kankouro was overtaken by the bugs.

The thick smoke seemed to settle well below the level of the spectators, leaving them all unaffected. Likewise, the Hokage and all those with him were also safe, due to a minor wind jutsu, courtesy of one of the Jounin.

Once it cleared, Shino was seen on his knees emptying the contents of his stomach violently on the ground, while Kankouro was sitting in the same spot, covered with the kikai bugs.

Hayate couldn't quite tell who had the upper hand in this fight so decided to let it continue to see what was going to happen next.

Kankuro could feel the insects draining off his remaining chakra, so he dropped his control of the puppet and began to lazily squash them as he watched his opponent struggle with the poison he had introduced to him.

"You know, unless you get the antidote, you'll probably be dead within a few minutes."

The Sand Puppeteer was rather proud of himself for not allowing any of the strain and fatigue he was feeling, enter his voice. The Aburame prodigy weakly turned his head to look at him.

"I suppose… you have this… 'antidote'?"

Kankuro smiled. "One way to find out…" He let the suggestion hang for a moment as the two watched each other.

Shino, after a moments thought, hung his head, and all of the kikai bugs, that had been attacking Kankuro, flew off and returned to their host.

"I forfeit."

"Winner Sabaku no Kankouro." It was an outcome that stunned almost everyone in the room. Said ninja made his way back up to the stands to rejoin his siblings, dropping a small vial of clear liquid in front of the now shivering Leaf Gennin. Medics rushed in and administered the vaccine. The effects were mostly immediate, as the convulsions stopped.

The medics carried him to the infirmary just to be sure he would recover fully.

"Next match…Akamichi Choji vs Misumi Tsurugi"

Naruto barely paid attention to most of this round beyond wishing Choji luck. He was contemplating the puppet that the Sand Puppet user possessed.

In a lot of ways it resembled his own Blade. At least as far as basics were concerned. However there were a lot of things about the boy's control of it that bothered him to no end. He couldn't quite place it, it just looked too…artificial.

Naruto had practiced with all three of his puppets so much that they were all an extension of him. He almost didn't even have to think about controlling them, well at least that was the case before that new seal was placed over THE seal. It was, still, interfering with his control. He hoped that Kakashi came through with finding someone to fix it. He wanted to be at his best of he had to face that other puppeteer in the next round.

He came out of his thoughts in time to see Choji flailing around the room waving enlarged limbs around with Kabuto's teammate, literally, wrapped around his body.

'_Huh…'_

Naruto got a fiendish smile on his face as be began to pay careful attention to his friends opponent, committing his style to memory as best as he could. After this, he promised himself, he'd start carrying around a notebook or something, just so he could keep better track of his ideas for new puppets.

Choji, after a few minutes of their antics, finally expanded to the size of a large ball and began to roll around the room, with his opponent still wrapped around him.

The crashed headlong into a wall and when the smoke cleared, both could be seen lying on the ground, back in their normal shapes and clearly unconscious.

Hayate just shook his head, mirroring the actions of Asuma. "Both fighters are eliminated. Neither advance."

The medics took them away and everyone looked up to the board for the final match.

It barely took Kabuto a few second to realize who he was set to fight. He looked to his right and saw the red-haired Gennin from Suna walking towards the stairs. He quickly took another look at the information card on this Sabaku no Garra, and it looked, to Naruto at least, like he was going to forfeit…again.

Kabuto knew that fighting anyone with this many Leaf ninja, not to mention the Hokage, watching so closely, would be bad for him. Especially when fighting this particular individual. Against anyone else he might have just purposely lost, but against Garra, he would be hard pressed to just survive.

He cast a quick glance at the Sound team, and met the eyes of their 'Sensei' for barely a second. The message in those eyes were clear.

'…_Crap…'_

Resigned to his fate he followed the boy to the floor.

No sooner had the match begun then Kabuto was struck in the face by a small object, causing his nose to bleed and his glasses to break. Uttering a few discreet obscenities, most aimed at the blonde boy that had forced him into this match, he examined what had hit him. When he saw that it was a simple cork, she looked at his opponent in confusion only to see that sand was pouring out of the large gourd on his back and coming at him in waves.

What followed was the most satisfying few minutes of Naruto's young life, as he watched the suspicious Gennin, dodge, flip and just plain run away from the sand. He couldn't help but laugh.

When Kabuto was as far away as he could get from Garra, he launched himself as high as he could and threw two handfuls of shuriken at the boy, only for all of the small throwing stars to be intercepted by the sand.

He cursed again when he saw that a large bed of sand spikes waited for him where he was about to land. Before he was anywhere near them he used a replacement technique to retreat behind one of the pillars behind his opponent.

Kabuto was looking around him for something he could use to at least put up a show before giving up, and again caught the gaze of the Sound Jounin through a crack in the floorboards above him.

…_sigh…_

He straitened what was left of his glasses and took out a strange curved Kunai. Kabuto launched himself out of the shadows and at the red-heads back, when the knife was almost at his skin it was halted by the sand that had wrapped around the arm holding it. Kabuto began to panic. Garra half turned to face him and sand began to crawl up his body, covering his legs now as well as both his arms.

Curious Garra reached up and took the curved knife from him and examined it. "A medic nin's field knife…As a Medic your hands must be precious to you…"

Kabuto's eyes grew wide and he felt the sand tighten around his arms. He began to struggle and scream for the proctor to end the match.

Hayate would never have the chance. With a sickening crunch the sand compacted heavily, crushing his trapped arms from the elbow down.

"That's it! This match is over! Release him immediately!" The sickly Jounin was advancing on the scene.

Garra shrugged and the sand retreated back into his gourd, taking with it, not only a large amount of blood, but Kabuto's right arm as well.

Naruto cringed at the sight. He had wanted to mess with the person who had apparently stolen classified information from the Hokage, but this was beyond even what he had intended. With an amputation like that it looked as though he had ended his career.

Naruto edged he way closer to Kakashi. "Sensei…did you find out anything about him?"

Kakashi hadn't even taken his eyes from the book he was reading during that match.

"Yes, apparently he was the only survivor of a village that was involved in a war with Kumo."

"Kumo…"

"He was found by one of the Medic Units and brought back to the village. The medic who found him, raised him like his son."

Naruto sighed, "Well that explains why he's a medic nin, but what about everything else?"

"There was nothing in his records that appeared suspicious."

He thought about that for a second. "Which record?"

"His personal ninja profile."

"Like the ones that have the same information as his info cards?"

"…"

"Sensei?"

Naruto turned to find that his sensei was no longer behind him, but standing next to the Hokage.

Down on the floor the medics were in the process of taking Kabuto away to the infirmary. When the floor was cleared, Hayate called all of those who had made it past the preliminary round to the center of the floor.

The Hokage stepped up next to Hayate to give a speech.

"Congratulations to all of you who've successfully completed this stage of the Chunnin selection exams. The Final test will begin in precisely one month. A lot has happened over the course of the last week. Your skills have been tested time and time again. Now you will have the next month to refine them, and perhaps come up with some new ones as well."

Two Chunnin, the two from before the first test, carried in a small box and a large board with a tournament bracket laid out on it.

At the Hokage's direction all of the finalists proceeded, one by one, to take a numbered ball from the box. Afterward their numbers and names were recorded onto the board.

"The matches for the next and final round will be as follows. Uzumaki Naruto Vs Sabaku no Kankouro…Uchiha Sasuke Vs Sabaku No Tamari…Sabaku No Garra Vs. Hyuga Hinata… Nara Shikamaru Vs. Tushi Kin. I wish all of you good luck in the final round."

And with that they were dismissed. The teams all reunited with their sensei's and went their separate ways.

AN: OMG this was a long chapter. I'm sorry about the long wait, but I wanted to make sure that I had the preliminaries were over with by the time I finished. I hope everyone is happy with not only my match ups in this round but the finals as well.

As for the next chapter…I'll probably stretch the month break out into two chapters only so I can get them out faster. You might think you know what I've got planned for the month…but you're probably wrong.


	11. Chapter 11

Puppets of the Leaf

Puppets of the Leaf

By Riotv2

Chapter 11:

Following the conclusion of the preliminaries, Team 7, being the only team to make it through without having someone hospitalized, met at Ichiraku's for a team meeting.

Currently Naruto was on his sixth bowl while the others hadn't finished their first.

"So Sensei…" Naruto asked around a mouthful of noodles. "…what kind of training are we going to do for this month?"

Said Jonin was sitting as calmly as ever, ramen untouched, with Kubikiri Houcho resting up against the bar. "Hnnn…beats me."

At that, all three of his students dropped their chopsticks, and shouted as one. "WHAT?!"

_sigh_

"Look, I've already found a teacher for Sasuke, I've arranged for Sakura to apprentice at the hospital to help with her medic techniques, and I've asked the Hokage to give Naruto another scroll to work on."

Naruto put his bowl down, empty, with the others. "Why can't you teach us Sensei? Isn't that **your** job after all?"

With another heavy sigh, Kakashi closed his book, a sure sign that he was being serious.

"I can't train you two for the finals. I have… other matters …to attend to."

Sakura narrowed her eyes at him. "If you're going to spend this month reading your 'book', then…"

"Sakura…" Kakashi met her eyes and she saw that he wasn't messing around. "…there are… things… happening that I must prepare for."

"You're going to be training." This, from Sasuke who until now had been completely silent.

"Hai, I've been neglecting my own training for too long."

"Does this have anything to do with Kabuto?"

The question had caught them all off guard. Naruto hadn't discussed his suspicions with his two teammates, and they both had looks of confusion written across their faces.

"Yes and no. Kabuto…never made it to the infirmary after his match. ANBU found the medics that were transporting him, dead. He must've known that he'd been found out, and escaped the village."

"Found out? What do you mean? What's going on Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura didn't like what she was hearing, and was quickly becoming frightened.

"Kabuto, was a spy."

Sakura's gasp of shock was the only thing that could be heard for several seconds.

"Listen to me, all three of you. The only reason I'm telling you this is, first, Naruto was the one who uncovered him to begin with when he took his info card during the first exam, and second, because of your encounter with a certain Nuke-nin during the second test."

"You mean Kabuto was working for **him**?"

"We don't know, but it's too much of a coincidence for us to ignore."

Sasuke stood up and approached their teacher. "So why exactly are you going to train? What's going to happen?"

"I have to train…because after I left you in the tower…I had an encounter of my own with...**him**."

Flashback

_Kakashi appeared in a puff of smoke outside the tower, located in the center of Training Field 44, also known as the Forest of Death. He looked again at the small card he held in his hand. It was highly disturbing that a Genin could have found all the information contained in this one card let alone on all the other information he's supposed to have, but then again one of his own students had managed to break into the Kage Tower to steal the forbidden scroll, though Kakashi suspected that the Hokage had actually let him take it purposely._

_Never the less, he had to report this as soon as possible. _

"_So, Kakashi…How is your Sharringan coming along, hmm?"_

_The Jonin froze. He knew that enthralling, serpentine voice. He'd never forget it. After all he had been there the day the Third confronted Orochimaru, forcing the Sanin to flee the village. He had just started his career in the ANBU, and they had discovered his lab._

_Now the Jonin turned to find him standing near the base of the tower, looking exactly as he had then, as if age and time no longer affected him, though he should be in his late fifties by now._

"_Orochimaru…It's been a long time."_

"_Yes, hasn't it. I see you've picked up a Zanbato, I never figured you for the type."_

"_Why are you here? More experiments? Or are you still hoping the Third will name you his successor…"_

_With that the Snake Sanin let out a deep hissing laughter. "Oh you always were amusing Kakashi…no I'm no longer interested in ruling this pathetic village. I've just come to check up on one of your students, whom I have a vested interest in."_

"_Funny, I never had you figured as a hetero. But I guess if it means that much to you I can arrange an introduction to Sakura."_

"_Ahh, I see you've inherited your sensei's wit." Kakashi was satisfied to hear that he was starting to get to the traitor. "Too bad you didn't inherit his skill as well."_

_With that last word, Orochimaru threw out his arm, and several snakes flew towards the Jonin, who had Kubikiri Houcho out and in front of him to intercept them before they connected._

_When he felt their impact on the flat side of his sword, he went into action, throwing the massive blade at his opponent, and running through several hand seals faster than most could accurately follow. _

_The spinning blade cleaved Orochimaru in half to reveal him as a mud clone. Having finished the seals Kakashi ran strait at a nearby tree, hand held back and away from him, a ball of lightning, screaming like a thousand birds charging up as he went. _

_Kakashi thrust the Raikiri into the tree just as the smirking ninja seemed to melt out of its surface and it exploded into a hail of wooden shrapnel as they once again faced each other down. _

_Seeing no other choice, Kakashi raised his Hitai-ate and unveiled a spinning red eye containing three tomoes._

"_At last, the Sharringan, I feel fortunate to be the first in years to see it twice in as many days."_

"_You'll not lay another hand on Sasuke."_

"_Ohh don't worry I wont go near him again, until __**he**__ comes to __**me**__, that is."_

"_Wont happen."_

_Kakashi charged strait in at him, throwing a complicated series of taijutsu maneuvers at him, only for the snake to weave in and out of them with no difficulty. Without warning Orochimaru hooked his front leg around Kakashi's, took him by the wrist and hurled him over his head, only for him to land in a crouch as the Jonin managed to straiten himself out in mid air. _

_As it turned out, the throw had placed him relatively close to where his oversized sword had landed. Taking it by it's long handle, he again ran at the Sanin, and brought the blade around to slash him in half again, to no avail as he was no longer there. The Snake Sanin was now standing behind him and Kakashi's eyes widened as he felt a kick plant itself into his back, sending him across the clearing. As Kakashi hit the ground, he disappeared in a puff of smoke, revealing a log in his place._

_Orochimaru smirked wider and turned to see Kakashi leaping off of the side of the tower and coming at him with the sword raised over his head. The Nuke-nin took a step back and the massive blade buried itself into the ground at his feet. Kakashi used the momentum of his fall and pivoted on the handle of the embedded sword to bring both legs around in a kick that actually managed to catch his enemy off guard. The surprising attack impacted his chest, and Kakashi heard the sound of a bone crack._

'It's no good…'_he thought to himself as Orochimaru recovered himself _'It takes more stamina than I have to wield this sword effectively, It's just too heavy, my movements with it are too slow, not that I could beat him without it. He's faster than I am at my best, and ninjutsu, are his specialty.'

"_My, my, Kakashi, this has been fun, unfortunately I need to be on my way. Do say hello to Sasuke for me, wont you." Orochimaru then merged with the ground beneath him and was gone, as several ANBU, as well as Mitarashi Anko appeared on the scene._

_Kakashi sagged to his knees, letting the sword bear most of his weight and re-covered his eye._

Flashback End

"Sufficed to say, I couldn't win. So, I need to train. I used to actually be much stronger than this."

Their sensei admitting to something like that actually unnerved them in a way that Naruto shuddered to think about, and for a few tense moments they were all silent, before Sasuke, for once, spoke up first.

"Then who did you get for my training?"

Kakashi smirked. "He's a Special Jounin sensei, named Ebisu." Naruto had to cover up his mouth to keep from laughing. The two Sharringan users looked at him strangely before Kakashi continued. "He owes me a favor, so he'll be working with you on your conditioning for the next couple of weeks. Afterward you'll come back to me to work on your Sharringan until the exam."

Sasuke nodded, apparently satisfied with the arrangements, and left to return to his home so he could freshen up before meeting with this Special Jounin. After all, he hadn't had a decent shower since before the first exam.

Next Kakashi turned to Sakura and gave her the name of the doctor that would be overseeing her medical training until the exam was over, and she too left to see to her hygiene.

Finally he turned to Naruto to see that he had finished off two more bowls of beef ramen, bringing his total to nine. "I know, I know I'll go get the new scroll from the Old Man." Naruto hopped off of the stool he had been sitting on and made his way out, only for Kakashi to stop him at the flap covering the upper part of the entrance.

"Naruto, I thought you'd like to know I managed to get into contact with someone who can take care of that…problem for you." He instantly had the boy's attention.

"Who?"

"Just meet us at our training field, after you freshen up and retrieve the new scroll."

Naruto nodded enthusiastically and ran out of the stand calling his thanks to Ayame for the food.

It was then, that Kakashi realized that he had made a critical, fatal error in judgment, and had made a mistake that Iruka had warned him about ever since he had taken on the three Gennin as his team.

He had let Naruto trick him into paying for lunch.

Just as he realized this, the attractive girl, whose father owned the stand, handed him the bill.

Now clean, and having gotten the, not just one, but two scrolls from the Hokage, Naruto made his way to the training ground that he had taken his team's survival test on. When he arrived he wasn't surprised to find that he was alone, it was Kakashi he was supposed to be meeting after all. It only made sense that his contact should be late too.

So to pass the time until they arrived, he assumed that he had at least two full hours, he sat himself leaning up against the very pole he had once found himself tied to, and began to look through the larger of the two scrolls he had just received. It began by going into extreme detail about different ways to make puppets that could be enhanced though seals, and then began going over the very most basic of the basics on the subject, saying after only a few paragraphs that he should find out about seals from somewhere else, since it would take hundreds upon hundreds of scrolls to explain the subject and, frankly, she wouldn't live long enough to finish writing them.

Naruto smirked. Oddly, after everything he'd been through recently, the old woman's familiar handwriting, and crude, to the point language, made him feel more relaxed than the hot shower that he had taken earlier.

But she was right. He would have to find someone to teach him about seals if he was going to have any hope at all of implementing the few she had included in this scroll.

Next the scroll described a theory she had about a way to get the puppets to perform jutsu's, but had never bothered to try it since her retirement, and figured maybe he could, if he lived long enough to get this far.

It was then that he heard a voice behind him near the memorial stone, and turned to see Kakashi standing there, with Zabuza's sword on his back and, this shocked Naruto, no little orange book in his hand. He was standing over the memorial stone with the names of fallen hero's on it.

He strained to hear what his sensei was saying.

"…I'm going to train harder again Obito. You'll see. Do you remember that technique you tried to show me when you became a Chunin? The one you said that you'd created specifically for the exam? Well…I'm going to teach it to Sasuke for him to use in his exam. I think you'd be proud of how far your cousin's come in such short time…"

'…_cousin… is he talking to one of Sasuke's relatives?'_

"…and don't worry Sensei, I'm taking care of Naruto also,…laugh …well…in-so-much as he needs me anyway..."

Naruto was so riveted by the mention of his name, and why Kakashi's sensei would be interested in him, that he never noticed the shadow creeping over him until it had completely covered him.

"You know, it's not considered polite to eavesdrop onto other peoples conversations."

Naruto slowly turned to take in the large form of the old man standing behind him, whose own face contorted from arrogant to shock as he got a good look at Naruto.

'_By Kami…he looks just like you Minato…'_

The boy before him sheepishly rubbed the back of his head as Kakashi walked over to join them.

"Ohh good you two have already met. Well then I guess I can just go ahead and leave. Ja- Ne." Kahashi vanished in a swirl of leaves and Naruto sighed heavily, and looked up at the man who was just staring at him expectantly.

"So…" the boy started awkwardly "…can you really fix my seal for me?"

The man scoffed. "Just show me."

Grumbling about bossy old geezers under his breath, Naruto lifted up his shirt and channeled chakra to his stomach, brining the inflicted seal to the surface.

The old man, who had yet to even give Naruto his name, looked it over with a critical eye, and hummed to himself for a moment before straitening up. "Do you have any trouble with your chakra control, more than usual I mean?"

Naruto gritted his teeth.

"Now don't get all angry with me. Having that beast sealed inside you is bound to mess with your control, and this extra seal can't be helping too much."

Naruto, still slightly insulted by the man's remark just pouted and turned his head to the side. "Yea…I would say that my level of control has been effectively cut in half by that stupid thing."

The white-haired man raised an eyebrow. "Just half? You shouldn't even be able to use chakra at all. And Kakashi tells me that you managed to remain conscious after this was placed on you?"

The boy nodded, now thinking back at how even that snake bastard had been mildly surprised by that.

"Interesting…ohh well, yea I can fix this no problem…but it's gonna hurt like hell."

Naruto grimaced and nodded slowly. He closed his eyes tightly, and the old man before him preformed a few hand seals. Before Naruto knew what had happened the man shoved his hand into the boy's stomach, in the exact place Orochimaru had, and he was sent to the ground, clutching his stomach. The pain was short lived however, as relief slowly spread outward from the points of impact.

He once again got to his feet and could feel his chakra flowing through his body without impediment. Oddly, he could never remember feeling so…free. The old man interrupted his thoughts with a grunt. "So…try using a jutsu or something to get a feel for your control."

Naruto nodded and took out the three scrolls containing his puppets. He bit his thumb and with a flick of his wrists and three puffs of smoke he had summoned all three. Blade crouched low before him, Kyu on his shoulder, and Kunoichi standing behind him.

He had strings connected to all three and was shocked to find that he had full control over them all. He could feel it, just as he knew he could raise his arm without actually doing it, he knew without even trying, he could manipulate all three. Keeping track of them in a fight…that would take a lot of work, but at least now he had a goal for the month.

He relaxed his posture, and looked over to see the old man staring at him, or more specificly at Kunoichi, with hearts in his eyes and drool hanging from his mouth, and mentally smacked himself. _'Just great…another pervert sensei…'_

Out loud, he shouted at him. "OY! Stop drooling after my puppet Ero-baka!"

To his shock the man came out of his lusting fantasies instantly.

"Puppet?"

The old man walked over to him and poked the female puppet in the forehead.

The 'flesh' gave only slightly more than actual human flesh would have.

"Huh…" He looked down at the cloaked figure, and at the fox on the kids shoulder.

"A puppet user…" He then burst out laughing, which only served to piss Naruto off.

"What's so funny, you bastard?"

He waved it off. "Nothing, just never thought I'd see a puppet user in the Leaf. It's a Suna technique after all, and an inferior one at that." He began to walk away, and was stopped when two arrows hit the ground at his feet.

"You wanna repeat that old man?!" Naruto's voice was calm, but the killing intent that was being unleashed into the field was anything but.

The old man turned around. "I said, Puppetry is a waste of time. Now, toad summoning on the other hand…that's an art that speaks for itself."

Naruto cocked his head to the side. _'Toad summoning?' _

At the kids confused look, the old man must've realized that Naruto still had no idea who he was. He smiled. And after a few drops of blood and a rather large explosion of smoke he appeared on a large red frog about as tall as the memorial stone, and began to go through his introduction as the Toad Hermit Jiraya.

Naruto just stared at the antics of the, obviously senile, old man. He looked at the oversized version of his wallet and scoffed. "And just what makes you think that frog is superior to my puppets?" Naruto turned away and started off towards the three poles.

Jiraya, not used to being dismissed by anyone, became angry. He lunged out at the boy, grabbed him by his shoulder, and turned him around. It was then, just as he met the boy's eyes, and saw the smile on his face that he realized. The shoulder he grabbed had a fox on it before his introduction. He turned around to see the fox sitting atop of the frog, which was now sprawled out on the ground, and asleep, with three senbon sticking out of its head.

Jiraya's jaw dropped. He then clenched his fist and grabbed the boy by his shirt. "WHAT THE HELL DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!"

"Proving a point. Your frogs aren't better than my puppets."

Jiraya let him go and considered.

After a moment he got an evil smirk on his face. "You think that proves anything?"

"What the hell are you talking about perv? I defeated your summon."

"First…stop calling me that! Second…that wasn't a battle orientated summon."

Naruto took the bait. "Fine then, go on and summon one that can fight. I'll kick its ass and prove it to you."

Jiraya chuckled. "Ok, but don't say I didn't warn you."

With a smile Jiraya once again preformed the summoning technique, and with an explosion, much larger than the last, he was standing atop a frog that was bigger than most of the buildings in the village. It was a light tan in color with a deep brown on its back. The frog had twin katana on its back tied with a sash.

Naruto's control over his puppets slipped and they fell to the ground.

"Well Gaki? Can you match this?"

Naruto just stared at the giant frog before him, then resealed his puppets and walked away, towards town.

"Hey! Where are you going?" Jiraya called out to him.

"To build a puppet that can take that thing out." He didn't stop walking until Jiraya called out again.

"Hey how about this… if you can build a puppet that can match this toad, then I'll acknowledge its superiority, if you can't…then you must let me teach you the summoning technique."

"Deal…" Something occurred to Naruto at that moment. "Yo perv…how about if when I win you help me out with learning about some seals."

"Seals huh? Sure, why not. But you only have a week."

Naruto never responded. He just made his way to the shop where he purchased all of his puppet supplies. Upon his arrival he was met at the door by the old man who ran the shop.

"Naruto, good to see you. Need some more weapons?"

He shook his head. "Not this time. But could you help me get some wood……a lot of it?"

The next week passed in a blur for Naruto. The shop keeper had taken him to a lumber yard, and he helped Naruto purchase as much wood as he would require for his newest project.

After having the lumber delivered to the mans shop, he summoned several Kage Bunshin, remembering the alterations one had preformed on Kunoichi back in wave, and they all descended on the piles of wood with a frenzy. He worked tirelessly day and night, only pausing to create more clones when they ran out of chakra.

During the course of the week the shop owner began to see what Naruto was intending, and had mixed feelings about it, but he liked the boy and trusted him to not do anything to get himself into trouble.

On the day of the deadline, Naruto stood back and admired his work. It was by far the most ambitious thing he'd attempted in his life. Then the thought struck him. "Ohh crap how do I seal something like this?"

A low chuckle from behind him answered the question. He turned to see the shop owner and the Third standing there admiring his handiwork. "G…gi-san?"

"Naruto…this is…a very interesting puppet. Do you think you'll be able to handle it?"

Naruto looked back at his new creation, and smiled. "Yea it shouldn't be a problem. Um… could you make me another storage scroll for it please?"

The Hokage laughed again. "Of course, on the condition that you'll let me accompany you to meet with Jiraya. I can't wait to see the look on his face."

Naruto smirked in impending triumph. Granted, he now owed the old man enough money for the wood, that when he did pay it off he'd be able to retire, but it was more than worth it, he'd decided.

As they arrived at the training field again, Jiraya, who had been waiting there, and going over his notes for his latest book stood up and noticed the rather long scroll strung across the kids back. It wasn't that thick, but it was wide, to cut down on the bulk he was going to carry, the Sanin assumed. Then he saw who was accompanying the brat and suddenly wasn't so confident about this. _'Sensei wouldn't be here unless it was to see me lose to this kid.'_

The boy approached. "You remember our deal right? I win and you teach me about seals?"

"Yea, yea…" Jiraya bit his thumb and summoned the duel sword bearing frog once again. "…let's see what you've got."

Naruto took the scroll from his back and bit his thumb as he threw it open. Smearing his blood on it he unleashed an explosion of smoke nearly the same size as the one resulting from Jiraya's summoning.

When it cleared Jiraya found himself staring at Naruto, on the same eye-level as him. The boy had a triumphant smile on his face, and brought his hands up, with thick chakra strings running from each finger. As he held up his arms he also began to rise to surpass the height of Jiraya. When the puppet he was standing on reached its full height, nearly 6 or 7 feet above him, Jiraya just stared at him open-mouthed, then hunched forward.

"Fine…what do you want to know about seals?"

It didn't take Naruto long to realize that he would probably never learn to master the art of seal making. As his scroll had said, there was just too much about them to consider. So, he decided to concentrate on learning the ones in the scroll. Even Jiraya had been impressed with those. The few that Chiyo-sensei had given him could be copied easily enough, but understanding exactly what they did that was worrying him. The last thing he wanted was to accidentally place the seal for an exploding note inside his puppets….though the idea had some potential…

After looking them over with Jiraya, and deciding that none would suit the next, normal sized, puppet he was going to build, he described to the old pervert just what he wanted the puppet to do, and asked if there was a way to make a seal that would gain him the required effects.

As it turned out, there was. The Sanin told him that it was originally designed by a ninja of a village that no longer existed, and was created to breach the outer defensive wall of an enemy village. The seal was complicated, and rather large, but it caused whatever object it was affixed too, to lose its rigidity, when it was charged positively with chakra.

Naruto's eyes practically lit up. Jiraya drew out the seal on a scroll and gave it to the boy, who merrily skipped off to the shop keeper's yard, where he still had enough wood left over for several puppets.

That night, Naruto ran into his two teammates, as they were walking home from their respective training. Deciding to get something to eat together, since it had been a little over a week since they'd seen each other, they headed into a small restaurant, not Ichiraku's, despite Naruto's insistence.

The three sat in silence for a while, al of them thinking over various things, until Sakura decided to interrupt the quite.

"So how are you both doing with your training?"

Their responses were typically those of what was common with those two. Sasuke kept his answer down to the minimum 'fine', while Naruto began to get really excited about a new puppet he claimed to have built, Sakura took the tirade with a grain of salt, after all, this was Naruto, and if his puppet was even half of what he was claiming… it would be bigger than most of the buildings in the village.

After a few minutes of not listening to Naruto, Sakura interrupts him to ask Sasuke about his new sensei. At first it seemed that Sasuke wasn't going to answer her, but then he looked at Naruto, who looked like he was about to go into another description about a new puppet, so to forestall him, and save them both from having to listen to it, he quickly ran through his first meeting with the Special Jonin, Ebisu.

Flashback

_After Getting cleaned up and into fresh clothes, Sasuke met his new trainer at the hot springs, where Kakashi had told him to go. He arrived to see a man in a black bandanna and sunglasses leaning up against a low railing near the water. After the man saw him, he pushed himself off and approached._

"_Ahh Uchiha-san, It's a pleasure to finally meet you. Kakashi-san tells me that you will need some help with training for the exam finals?"_

_At the boy's curt nod, he adjusted his glasses and smirked at him._

"_Very well, first I'll need to get an idea of your overall skill…"_

_Without warning, Sasuke found himself the victim of a vicious assault from the black clad ninja. His speed, while not as fast as Kakashi, was impressive, as was his overall grace and precision, when it came to his attacks._

_Even with his Sharringan active, he still managed to work his way passed Sasuke's guard. Not all that surprising, considering that his Dojutsu was only at two Tomoes in each eye. He could pick up on subtle shifts in the mans posture, and even sometimes see faint foreshadows of his movements, but it was still a far cry from the nearly precognitive foresight, Kakashi had described for him once. _

_Another problem he was having was that, while he could sometimes see the attack coming, his reflexes were too slow to intercept them._

_A particularly fierce kick to the midsection knocked Sasuke into, and almost over the railing near the boiling hot water below them, and he was caught by Ebisu before he could go over._

"_Good, your control over your movements is highly advanced for a child your age. Not surprising given your clan…We'll need to work on your speed though, and consequently your reflexes. I'm going to show you a technique to augment your speed with chakra. So, the first thing we'll do is work on your chakra control. Tell me, do you know the water, walking exercise?"_

_The next two days were a wet burning blur for the Uchiha, as he was given a crash course in the new exercise, after which he quickly mastered it. _

_Ebisu, having judged his control to be of an acceptable level, next showed him how to channel Chakra into his legs in order to increase his movement speed in short bursts. The first time he had tried it; he pumped too much into his left leg and suffered a catastrophic cramp, which effectively ended their training for the day. _

_Finally, he had the boy, copy a kata form off of him using his Sharringan, and perform it over and over while wearing weights on his wrists and ankles. The Kata was designed to condition the body for increased flexibility, while at the same time the weights would help him with his speed, and adding to the weight when he can move freely with his current amount. Once again, though he found that he couldn't exactly copy the kata. He could see the movements in his mind, though they couldn't be transmitted to his body as readily as Kakashi had done against Zabuza, once again due to his sharringan's underdevelopment._

_End Flashback_

"At the end of this week, I'm supposed to go back to training with Kakashi. He said that he had something he wanted to teach me, but wouldn't tell me what exactly."

Naruto thought about that. _'"…I'm going to teach him the technique you developed…"'_

He thought about telling him what he had heard, but thought that if Kakashi cared enough to teach him the technique of a friend, maybe even teammate, he'd let Kakashi do it his way.

Remembering the scene he had witnessed at the Stone, he also recalled the other person Kakashi had been talking too. _'"…Don't worry Sensei, I've taken care of Naruto too…" who was his sensei?'_

"Hey guys I'll see you later, I need to go finish working on my puppet." Without waiting for a response, Naruto dropped some money on the table and ran out the door, while his two teammates just stared down at the table before them.

"Did he just…"

Sasuke nodded. "He actually paid for his food…" They shivered, with a sense of impending doom.

Naruto walked calmly through the training field, idly tossing a white scroll up and down in his hand. Lost deep in thought, he almost missed the shout of warning as several Kunai missed his head by a hair.

Naruto dropped to the ground and stared up at the throwing knives that almost ended his life, his breath coming in ragged gasps.

"Hey!! Are you o…IT'S YOU!"

Naruto turned to see a girl wearing a pink shirt with her hair up in buns atop her head. She was holding a few more Kunai and looked pissed.

Behind her three more people entered the clearing. "Tenten-chan…are you alrigh…"

Naruto's eyes widened as he recognized them all, now as the area was filling with a very potent killing intent, he gulped down some air and gripped his scroll tighter. Slowly he began to get to his feet to fend off the attack he could feel was about to come, probably from the Hyuga, who had activated his bloodline upon seeing him.

Neji took a step forward and was halted when a hand came to rest on his shoulder. "MY STUDENT! WHY ALL OF THIS UNYOUTHFUL ENGERGY?"

The man, Naruto decided, was an older version of Lee, complete with matching leg warmers. When he noticed that the attention of all three of his student's attention was solely focused on the orange-clad boy before them. "OHH I SEE, THIS MUST BE THE ONE WHO YOUTHFULLY ELIMINATED MY STUDENTS FROM THE SECOND EXAM. TELL ME MY YOUNG FRIEND, WHO MIGHT HAVE THE PLEASSURE OF HAVING SUCH A SKILLED AND YOUTHFULL PERSON SUCH AS YOU FOR A STUDENT?"

Naruto blinked, the killing intent hadn't diminished in the least, but Neji had turned off his eyes, and his female teammate, Tenten, had put away her kunai.

"Uhh…Ka..Kakashi-sens…"

"HATAKE KAKASHI!! MY ETERNAL RIVAL!!"

"Eternal Rival?"

"YOSH! I HAVE KNOWN HIM SINCE WE WERE AT THE ACADEMY TOGEATHER!"

"Since the academy…then you must know who his sensei was?!"

Mighto Guy adopted a thoughtful posture, as he looked the boy over then looked to his own team. Tenten looked confused at the interaction between them and both Lee and Neji looked as though they wanted to fight him, though for two completely different reasons. He smiled, a plan forming in his mind.

"Yes, I do know who his sensei was, however I won't tell you unless you agree to help me with something."

"What? Anything!"

"I would like you to spar with my most youthful students."

The comment froze him in his tracks. "S…spar…with them?"

He looked over to the three students; two of the three were smiling, while the Hyuga simple reactivated his Byakugan. Naruto gulped, then stood upright and tightened his headband. "Sure, why not. It'll make a good warm up for the finals. Too bad you guys won't be there."

The comment brought the killing intent to such a level one could have cut it with a kunai.

Lee began to, enthusiastically, move forward, but was forestalled by his female teammate. "I'll get this one first if you don't mind. You guys can beat up what's left."

She took her position opposite from him in the clearing. Naruto recognized her from stumbling on this teams training session before, just after graduating. Watching one of her attacks actually served as the inspiration for one of Blades, weapons. Naruto grinned as he placed the white scroll he had been carrying into his hip pouch and took one off his leg.

Tenten mirrored his action by producing a green scroll from her pouch. They both bit their thumbs and wiped blood across the surface of their scrolls, and in two puffs of smoke, Tenet's being considerably smaller, they each called forth their weapons of choice.

Tenten had produced a pair of Tonto, which she held as she would a Kunai, with the blade extending downwards. She balked however as she saw what Naruto had summoned. Crouched low before him, and completely covered by its cloak, Blade sat watching her with a blank unnerving stare, from under its hood.

Guy signaled the start of the match from his position under one of the trees, with the two boys standing behind him, and Tenten immediately ran at Naruto with weapons raised hoping to score a crippling blow immediately. Naruto smirked. He knew that out of all his puppets, Blade was his best for a weapons user like her, unless of course you counted the one he built to show up that pervert of a Sanin, but he had promised the third he wouldn't use it unless it was a dire emergency and he had no other choice, so he let her come until the last second when in a large flurry of it's cloak, Blades arm came up to intercept her attack with it's own weapons.

Rather than display the shock that usually came from such an encounter, Tenten pivoted to her right and came in for a low sweeping cut across the puppets midsection. This too was caught on its other arm.

With a push of his hands Naruto sent Blade in close to her locking both of her weapons together with those of his puppet. He hoped to bring her in close enough so that he could use one of his other blades to capture her and win the fight, however she must have read his intention, because she instantly let go of one of her small swords, and back peddled away, throwing the second at Naruto in the process.

The projectile caught him across the leg, and he puffed into smoke, revealing that it had been a clone. Blade started to sag to the ground, only for it to rush at her before any part of it could touch the grass.

Tenten now had no idea where Naruto was, and couldn't look for him because of the puppet currently taking swipes at her, left and right. She leaped up into the air and threw two handfuls of Shuriken at her attacker, all of which struck it in its stomach and chest, and all of which had absolutely no effect whatsoever.

She had no idea what to do. She knew that she needed to find Naruto, but with that puppet of his not giving her a chance to attack, she had no chance to look for him. Her frustration increased when the puppet flew into the air after her. She took two Kunai out of her leg holsters and met the two outstretched weapons of her cloaked opponent. Its continuing momentum pushed her farther into the air, and it was all she could do to keep those odd swords from cutting her.

Finally it changed direction and began pushing her downward toward the ground. She began to struggle to push away from it but it actually wrapped its arms around her waist, and held fast. The two plunged into the ground with roughly half the power of Lee's Lotus technique guessed their teacher, but still by no means was it a small impact.

Tenten rolled out of the dust that had been kicked up and rose unsteadily to her feet holding an arm that looked as if it was bent at a slightly odd angle. When the dust cleared, she searched for her odd opponent, and saw that he was still lying in the same spot he landed, unmoving. She could clearly see the two Kunai she had stabbed into he back right before they hit the ground, and sighed, thinking she had managed to kill whatever type of summon that thing had been. She began to relax, until the rustle of fabric alerted her to the fact that the thing was moving again, at the same speed as before despite the wounds she had inflicted. It was coming at her and with one arm fractured there was very little chance of her effectively defending herself, but she would try.

She hopped to the side and pulled out one scroll from her pouch. With her one hand she threw it open and began to spin while pushing her chakra into the paper. The momentum kept it from floating away from her while she proceeded to throw all manner of melee weapons at the cloaked figure. Though only half as many as she would have been able to with both hands, it was still a fairly effective attack, and her opponent began to weave in and out of her missiles, knocking aside all manner of blades with it's two 'hands', until a particularly large curved blade hit it square in the chest, and spun it around before it fell to the ground. Her attack ceased and she stopped her spinning, now clutching her forearm tighter than before. The spinning, it seamed, hadn't helped her any.

She watched the figure closely, not ready to believe that it was over, and as she expected it began to move. This time when it rose, one of its arms fell to the floor under it, and she had to suppress a shudder. She once again reached into her Kunai holster and took one of the knives into her hand ready for its inevitable charge.

To her surprise however, it didn't advance, instead the clearing filled with Naruto's voice. The echo was such that she couldn't pinpoint his exact location. "Look, I realize that you're angry with me, but why don't you give up? This is only a spar after all, and I can see that you're hurt."

"Give up?! No way, I won't quit against some coward that lets a summon do his fighting for him!"

"Summon? Is that what you think you're fighting?" His voice had taken on a hint of amusement. _'He thinks this is funny!'_

Just as that thought occurred to her she caught a sight of something in the trees almost directly behind the…thing…she'd been fighting. It wasn't much, just a small patch of orange. It was then that she remembered the ugly jumpsuit Naruto had been wearing. And she smiled.

With a flick of her wrist she tossed the throwing knife at the patch of color, eliciting a yelp of surprise. After a moment Naruto dropped down from his hiding spot with a look of shock on his face. He was holding the kunai and had a small tear in his shoulder. _'…only nicked him then…'_

"How'd you know I was there? You couldn't have followed my voice…"

She raised an eyebrow. "Uhh you're wearing a bright orange jumpsuit." _'This guy made it to the finals?!'_

He looked down at himself and mentally, and physically, smacked himself. _'Crap, I guess I need to change my look a bit… but for right now.'_

"My offer still stands, quit now and take care of that arm."

She reached for her Kunai again, and Naruto twitched his fingers. The 'face mask' that Blade wore split and opened firing one single senbon at her hand, just barely scratching it, but it was enough to make her drop the weapon she had been trying to get and she felt her hand go slightly numb, but she could still function with it.

After a second more Senbon followed and she was forced to retreat again. Shaking his head at the situation she now found herself in, Gai decided to step in.

"That's enough. I'm declaring Uzumaki-san the winner. Tenten you must get that arm addressed at once."

When she began to protest, her odd sensei interrupted her again. "Tenten, that boy has you out gunned with his puppet. You can't match it in your condition."

"Puppet?"

Naruto walked over to her with Blade at his side and a smile on his face. He pulled aside the puppets cloak to show that its body was made of wood and that it's feet, like its hands were swords. She looked at those with a look of revelation. _'He could have finished me when he had me in the air…I did lose.'_ She reluctantly nodded, acknowledging his victory.

"Ok…but if you don't mind I'll stay to watch the others fight too, my arm isn't that bad anyway." After Gai looked at her wound he gave his consent and she walked over to the tree his teammates were standing under. Lee whole-heartedly congratulated her on a well fought match and looked to Neji, who only motioned Lee ahead. The green clad boy leaped with glee and entered the clearing to face off against Naruto.

He set blade aside and took the white scroll from earlier out of his pouch. "I haven't used this one in battle yet, so you'll be the first to see it."

"I am Honored Uzumaki-kun!"

Lee had taken a stance that seemed to be very relaxed. He was standing upright with one hand behind his back and the other our before him palm open facing him, as if inviting him to attack. _'That's exactly what he's doing…'_ he realized. The stance looked as though he was being smug, that that was at odds with his personality. _'He likes to let his opponent have the opening move then, very well.'_

Repeating his summoning process, Naruto called forth his newest puppet. In a plume of smoke, appeared a figure dressed completely in white. The figure appeared to be well built, athletic, and only slightly more muscled that Lee himself. If one were to assume it was a living person that is, but by now that surprise had been wasted for the rest of their team. _'Ohh well, at least it fooled Tenten.'_

He hadn't been lying when he said this was the first time he'd be taking this puppet into battle. He had only tested it's abilities to be sure that they'd work the way he'd hoped, much to the chagrin of the Kage Bunshin he'd tried it out on, but it had worked, and he was quite happy with the aesthetic look of the puppet as well. The only feature on it that deviated from its white attire was a rounded plate of metal affixed over its face like a mask. There were no eye holes, no mouth; it didn't even appear to have a nose. In fact the only thing that stood out on the mask at all was the large red Leaf insignia that he had engraved on it. It was rough and filled with red paint to make it stand out against the grey metal.

However since he hadn't had an opportunity to practice with it, he had no style with which to fight with it, so he fell back on the technique that he had used on Kiba. He'd mimic his opponent. SO with a twitch of his fingers, he had the puppet emulate the fighting stance of Lee.

This caused the energetic boy to raise an eyebrow in confusion, and then break out into a grin. "They say that imitation is the sincerest form of flattery Uzumaki-kun. So I thank you for the complement." Before Naruto could respond to the boy's strange remark, Lee had closed to distance between himself and the puppet and smashed his foot into it's stomach, sending it into the air. Naruto was speechless. _'…F…fast…'_

The puppet came back down and landed in its same spot with a resounding thud. Naruto looked at it closely, it didn't seem like it was too badly damaged, and so he got it to its feet, and was slightly surprised to find that it wasn't damaged at all. That kick should have shattered its wooden frame, but it was still completely whole, though there was a small dent in its stomach, Naruto sent a small pulse of chakra into the puppet to activate the seals concealed beneath thee cloth and the dent popped back out, like it was…elastic or something…_ 'ohh…'_

Lee also noticed this and sent a punch into the stomach, followed by a quick few to its chest and finally one to its head, Naruto let them connect. The puppet bounced and recoiled from each blow, the last sending it back quite a few feet, and each time it was left un damaged, the neck of it did extend a lot farther than it should have, but it too came back to it's normal length.

Once again he got the puppet to its feet, and caused it to adopt Lee's stance, this time causing it to beckon Lee forward with a simple hand gesture. Lee, looking excited by the prospect, rushed at it once again, and threw another kick at its chest. This time however Naruto had anticipated the attack, and the puppet swung its arm out and intercepted the attack with its forearm, which then began to extend and coil around Lee's leg, moving up towards the boy's knee.

Naruto jerked his hand back towards him, and the puppet mimicked the act pulling Lee's leg forward, causing the shocked boy to lose his balance, and the puppet shot its other arm forward, it's fist connecting with Lee's face, sending him onto his back with his leg still tangled up in the seemingly elastic arm of Naruto's newest puppet.

To the young puppet users shock, though, Lee shook his head and broke out laughing. "What's so funny?"

Lee waved his hands while laughing. "No, nothing Uzumaki-kun, I just can't remember the last time I've had this much fun during a spar. YOUR FLAMES OF YOUTH ARE TRULLY INSPIRATIONAL!"

A loud 'YOSH' was heard from their teacher as he seemed to agree with his clone of a student.

Lee managed to role himself into a handstand, which stretched out the puppets arm, and then reversed direction slamming his loose foot into the puppets shoulder, causing it to lose its grip and Lee spun away into a crouch, now free of his captor. Naruto eased back on the amount of chakra he had been feeding the seal on that limb and the arm regained its former shape.

The smile still hadn't left Lee's face and Naruto had to admit, that he was also having a good time. Deciding to start things off this time, Naruto launched the puppet at his opponent, elongating both of its arms hoping to entangle the taijutsu user once again. The boy deftly avoided both appendages by first stepping aside then rushing forward at a speed that far exceeded that of the arms as they tried to catch him. When he didn't slow down, Naruto realized what he was doing, avoiding the puppet and going directly for the puppet user.

One of the first scrolls he had received on puppetry told him the main weakness of the technique was that most puppeteers were left physically weak because they focused on their puppet skills and while he had to admit, he wasn't as skilled in Taijutsu as most, he wasn't weak.

One of Naruto's favorite training techniques was to create an army of clones and have them attack him while he defended himself using his puppets. This, he discovered after the mission to wave, allowed him to train with his puppets, but also gave him the memories of his clones after they dispelled. He was essentially getting twice the training. Training which helped him greatly now as he cast out his hand, two fingers extended, and attached a chakra string to each of Lee's feet.

As Lee rushed at Naruto at full speed he thrust out a back hand at the boy, which the blond deftly ducked under and rolled away from him, pulling his hand back in an overly exaggerated gesture.

Lee only had a moment to think on it though, and his feet were violently pulled out from under him. Carried by his forward momentum, Lee tumbled head first across the ground, stopping only after clipping a tree with his side.

Naruto had brought his puppet to his side, both hands once again connected to it through his chakra strings, the puppet adopting a more traditional, and basic fighting stance.

It took a moment for Lee to gain his bearings, having knocked his head several times as he fell. He shook his head to clear the cobwebs from his mind, and tried to lift himself up on his arms, only to fall again when a sharp pain shot up his left arm.

In a flash of green Gai was at his student's side, examining his arm. There was a small lump just behind his wrist. Gai looked at Lee with a warm smile. Naruto and the others approached them to see if he was ok, Neji following a slower pace.

"Is he ok?" Naruto asked guiltily.

Gai smiled at his concern. "Hai, his arm is fractured. He'll be fine."

Naruto winced. "Sorry Lee, I didn't mean for…"

"Forget it Uzumaki-kun, it was a truly youthful fight." Lee extending his good hand and gave him a thumbs up with a huge grin planted on his face.

Naruto smiled, and returned the gesture. "Yea, we'll have to have a rematch when you get better."

For a moment Lee said nothing as he looked at Naruto, then he clenched his fist and thrust it towards the boy, fire igniting in his eyes. "RIVAL!"

Both Naruto and Tenten sweat-dropped, "O…hh,…o…k…"

Behind him Neji scoffed, causing them all to focus their attention on him. "Come…" He adopted a stance that was utterly alien to Naruto as his eyes bulged with veins. "… fate has already decreed that you cannot defeat me. So let us end this quickly."

"Uzumaki-kun…" Naruto turned back to Lee. "…be careful in this match. Neji-kun has been angry at you ever since our elimination from the exam. He is the strongest of the three of us, and considered a genius among the Hyuga, even though he is of the branch house."

"So what are you saying I can't win?"

Lee smiled again. "Not at all. Just be careful, he won't be pulling any punches."

Naruto grinned at the other members of Team Gai and took his place in front of the Hyuga, leaving his new puppet sitting against the tree with Lee. A fact that was not lost on Neji.

"So you're going to use another puppet to fight me? It won't make a difference. You cannot alter the course fate has set us upon. You will lose."

Naruto sighed. "Let me ask you something…what is it with you and all this fate crap? I mean let's say you're right. Lets say that fate had, for some reason, decreed that we would be meeting like this and that we were about to fight, and that I would lose…If all that is true, then why are you so mad at me for taking you out of the exam?"

Neji blinked. "What?"

"Think about it. If fate decides everything we do then that means that I was destined to take your scroll from you and that you were supposed to fail the exam. So, you really have no reason to be angry with me for doing it…yet here you are…_defying fate._"

"…"

"…"

Everyone present to hear the blonds comments fell deathly silent. As everyone's focus turned to Neji, they could all see the wheels turn in his mind as he came to understand…Naruto was right.

Neji stared at the orange clad ninja before him and, slowly, his eyes narrowed. "You…you…" Neji grew furious, his killing intent rising once more. It looked as though Gai would have to step in to prevent his student from murdering the youthful student of his eternal rival, but just as it had grown, the anger and Killing intent abated. Neji brought himself under control, and took a deep breath.

"You…are a test, set before me by fate. You cause me to question myself and everything around me. However…you are still going to lose."

Naruto just shook his head in exasperation, while taking the purple scroll off his leg. As he prepared to summon yet another of his growing collection of puppets, Neji spoke out, yet again.

"My eyes see all, Uzumaki. Thus far all of your puppets have been close combat types, with some moderate mid range capabilities. You are brash, loud and over confident in your skills. I suspect that your next puppet will not be any different."

Neji took that odd stance again his hands held open, and activated his bloodline once again, and Naruto completed his summoning, and now stood with his first puppet, Kunoichi next to him, it's, highly, revealing outfit accentuated by the innocent pose it had taken before Neji. Behind him, Naruto heard two distinct thuds as both Lee and Gai fell to the ground, their green spandex, now stained red. Tenten was just staring at him with her hands balled into fists. Naruto could hear her knuckles crack from there, and he shuddered, relieved that she didn't attack outright.

Neji was shocked at the puppet his opponent had chosen to face him with. His cheeks took on a rosy color as he looked at her…it…he tried instead to look at Naruto, but still found her clothing distracting. He grew still more uncomfortable as she…it…began to walk towards him, her hip swaying, and stopped when she was only a few feet away, just out of arm reach. Suddenly she bent forward and blew him a kiss, winking at him as she did so. Neji nearly lost himself. He ran forward in an attempt to destroy the offensive thing before him, only for the puppet to be pulled backward into the air, by its master. At the height of its leap, she pulled out the longbow that had been strapped to its back and fired two arrows which had seemingly appeared out of mid air.

Despite the distraction, Neji still had the presence of mind to sidestep the projectiles as they thudded home at his feet. He briefly looked down at them and then back up at both puppet and master. "It appears I was wrong about your puppet. It is obviously a long-range type. It will make this more annoying, but will not affect the outcome."

Again Neji ran at them, nowhere near as fast as Lee had, though still quite fast, and had to duck, dodge, and in general, avoid all of the arrows the puppet was sending his way, through it all his forward momentum was not stopped. When he got into range, Neji thrust his palm at Naruto, who moved his puppet into the path of the attack, catching it on her bow, while Naruto backed up a few paces to put some distance between them.

Neji gripped the bow with both hands as he began to spin rapidly, taking the puppet with him. Chakra erupted from his body and he found himself in a dome made of pure chakra. As he stopped spinning, he released the puppet, sending it crashing into its controller.

Naruto fell to the ground with his puppet as they collided, but instantly got her back up on her feet with an arrow pointed at Neji's chest.

"Uzumaki, I will acknowledge that you have some skill, and your puppets show a surprising amount of creativity, however as I have said, fate will not allow you to win. My eyes see al…"

"Your eyes…see only what I wanted them too." With a twitch of his fingers, Kunoichi fired her arrow, however rather than avoid the shot, Neji caught it out of mid air, and a moment later had to jump as a hail of senbon needles sailed passed him.

Neji focused his Byakugan back in the direction they had come from to see chakra strings running to the puppet Naruto had used to defeat Tenten. It was rushing at him, its blades poised to strike. Likewise the white puppet that had fought Lee was extending its arms in an attempt to hold him for the blades of the first.

'_So he can utilize more than one at a time…still not enough.'_

As they closed in on him, he once more began to spin and push chakra out of nearly every Tenketsu on his body creating the shield that was one of the Hugo's signature techniques. Blade was blown backwards, one of its arms broken off, and the arms of the other puppet had gotten tangled up as they were deflected by the Kaiten.

Naruto's jaw dropped. "H..how..did…"

"I told you, my eyes see all. The Byakugan grants me the ability to see in a 360 degree radius."

"So…you have eyes in the back of your head…got it. I'm still gonna kick your ass!"

Naruto brought Blade in once again while the white puppet soared up into the air above the ensuing battle. All the while he tried to keep Neji off balance with Kunoichi's arrows. It was just as difficult as he thought it would be to keep track of all three. His shots with Kunoichi were terribly off aim, Neji hardly even needed to dodge them, and he hit Blade more often than not.

The cloaked puppet was faring a little better, since most of his attention was focused on him, while all he was doing with the third was keeping it up above them until an opportunity presented itself, which it did moments later when he shifted focus to Kunoichi, to take better aim. Blade was hit in its chest with a palm thrust, and knocked back. The Arrow he had aimed, sailed right at Neji, and as he moved to catch it, the white puppet dropped down on him from above, it's arms and legs elongating as it did.

Seeing the falling puppet, Neji abandoned the arrow in favor of another Kaiten. The arrow broke in half from the force of the impact, and when Neji came to a stop he had his eyes closed, and a superior smirk on his face.

The smirk vanished, when as he opened his eyes to see the arms and legs of the new puppet all around him. They were planted just outside of the small crater that was created by the Kaiten, and the puppets body was suspended above him, like a canopy.

He had barely stopped his spin, when the puppet descended upon him, entangling his limbs like it had Lee. Naruto was careful to keep Neji's hands away from each other to prevent him from performing any hand seals.

They young Hyuga, was struggling with everything he had against the restraining puppet that had caught him. He had clearly seen what the puppet was doing, however the high spin he was engaged in at the time, made him unable to do anything about it, and while he had been trying to keep the domes created by his Kaiten small, to limit the amount of chakra that was consumed by the technique, it was still used up a lot of his chakra to use.

Most enemies, once having seen one of his clan perform it, wouldn't really bother to try to attack that would cause him to use it due to utter futileness, however this opponent, either he knew how much chakra it took to use it, and he was trying to make him run out, or…_ 'He's too dense to learn from his mistakes…'_

Neji rolled his eyes. Dense or not, the boy had caught him with his puppet. With his Byakugan still active, he could clearly see the chakra strings running from the puppet to the puppeteers' hands. He could see him controlling it, but didn't know enough about the technique to be able to anticipate its movements based on that.

Then as he focused on the strings, he saw them shrink a bit. As if the chakra was being stretched thinner. Then more strings shot out and attached themselves to the other two puppets again, while still another, single, string was sent off into the bushes to the side of the clearing.

This piqued Neji's curiosity, and he focused his sight, with no visible change in his struggle to alert his opponent, and saw that the string had attached itself to a small fox, that he recognized the boy to have from the first exam. It hadn't clicked then, but now that he had looked inside the small animal he could see that it was indeed a puppet. Its mouth was open and just seemed to be waiting. He focused on the mechanism inside the fox, and realized what the fox was there for.

'_Huh…a back up plan…ok…I'll admit he's good. I never even noticed his summon that one.' _The briefly tried to pinpoint just when in any of his three fights he could have placed that one there, since he had been watching the whole clearing the whole time, and then gave it up. It didn't matter when it got there, it was there.

Neji stopped his struggles and hung his head. There were a few loud gasps from his teammates, when they must have thought he had given up. _'Fools.'_

He began to gather his chakra as he would for the Kaiten, and distributed it throughout his body, focusing it at his tenketsu, and allowing it to build in pressure for a moment. Then he opened all of his chakra points at once, and allowed the chakra to escape in the form of small, sharp blades. He wiggled a little in his captivity, and the result was immediate.

The puppet's body, every part that was touching Neji, was shredded. The move caught Naruto off guard, and he instinctively made the puppet back off, before it was destroyed.

Neji fell to the ground on unsteady legs, his limbs having lost any feeling after being held for so long.

Naruto surveyed the damage to his puppet, its clothes were mostly ruined, and the surface of the wood was covered in deep scores, as it he had taken several hundred razors, and sliced them across its surface. He tried to make it elongate its limbs again, and as they did the cuts became more pronounced as if he was stretching out a scar. Its movement seemed to be ok none of the seals had been hit, thankfully. He didn't even want to think about trying to reapply them without the help of that perverted frog guy.

Neji was getting to his feet, and Naruto sent Blade at him again, only for the Hyuga to sidestep the attack, and wave his hand behind the puppet, which promptly fell to the ground in a clatter of wooden parts.

Naruto's eyes widened in realization, _'T…the strings…he cut them…he can see the chakra…'_

For the first time since the fight began, Naruto felt a flicker of doubt enter his mind. If he hadn't stolen their scroll, would he have been able to beat him during the preliminaries. Would he have even made it that far?

Neji read his body posture and nodded with approval. "Now you can see the truth. You have no chance. Fate has decreed me the winner."

Naruto's control fell away, and Neji could see the strings all fade away into nothing, as his other puppets, the fox included, joined the other one on the ground. Soon after, Naruto also slumped to his knees, as if someone had cut_ his_ strings. Neji began to approach. He focused his sight on him, bringing to bear the full weight of his all seeing eyes. He was intent on breaking his spirit completely.

"You weak, pathetic excu…"

He words dropped off as he picked up a slight flicker of movement from the boy's right hand. It had been fleeting, almost as if it were an effect of the light on Naruto's skin, but he couldn't shake the feeling off that he was missing something. His eyebrows shot up as he spread his sight all over the clearing again. The three puppets were still where they'd fallen. And the fox…he felt a small prick on his left leg.

This time he actually moved his head to look down at the object that had embedded itself into his thigh. _'A senbon needle…'_

Naruto stood up once again and Neji could see a faint, barely visible to even his bloodline, glow on the tip of his index finger, which steadily grew brighter, and attached to it was a chakra string, which ran into the bushes. Another twitch of his finger later and the fox puppet walked out of them.

'_He was only acting…he never dropped that string, he just made it so small the chakra was barely there at all…'_

Neji could feel a numbing sensation spreading throughout his leg, and knew that unless he did something quick, he would lose. _'No…fate has made me the winner…you can't avoid fates will…'_

With a great force of will, Neji forced his leg to respond as he slid into the opening stance of one of the main branches most devastating techniques. Naruto was just standing, noticed the sluggishness of the inflicted leg,and smirked.

"You, Uzumaki, are with the range of my Hakke…"

As their eyes met for a split second, Naruto found him self unable to move. "Eight Trigrams 64 Palms!"

Neji launched himself at the immobilized blond with all of the grace and precision, characteristic of his clan, though with less speed than Naruto was expecting. His first two strikes hit on Naruto's side, and intense pain, like that he felt when Orochimaru placed the seal on his stomach, and again when Jiraya released it. Then more pain followed when four strikes hit him on his shoulders, followed by eight on his legs, and sixteen on his chest and arms. Thirty two strikes found his chest stomach, and surprisingly his back, Neji was counting off on all of them. Finally, a new barrage seemed to hit everywhere that hadn't been hit so far, and Naruto was sent flying backward with the force of the final blow to his stomach. "64 Strikes!!"

Immediately after the attack, Neji also fell to the ground, the toxin in his leg, having moved on throughout the rest of his body. He managed to look over at his opponent and was shocked to see him looking back through gritted teeth.

"It is over…Uzumaki…you won't be able to continue…"

To Neji's utter horror, Naruto scoffed at the remark.

"My last attack has sealed your fate…along with your chakra."

Naruto sobered immediately, and realized that he was right. He could feel it, but couldn't mold it. Grumbling about stupid arrogant assholes who kept messing with his chakra system, Naruto slowly pushed his may off the ground with his arms.

Neji, who had been absolutely certain of a victory, nearly had a heart attack at the sight.

'_No…NO! How is this possible?! He should be down for the count!'_

It wasn't easy, his entire body was screaming in protest. He experienced pain in places he didn't even know could hurt. But still he willed his body to move. He had too. This bastard was asking for it. Neji had written him off as weak, just like the rest of the village…Naruto had made a promise to him self and to the village, that he would become Hokage, to do that he needed to change everyone's views on him. Already he'd had partial success with a limited group of people, and as he paused supported by trembling arms, their images ran through his mind.

'_Iruka-sensei…Kakashi-sensei…Sakura…Sasuke…Gi-san…Chiyo-ba-sensei…'_

One by one all of the rookies from his class also appeared.

He would change the village's opinion of him. He would show them all he wasn't weak…he wasn't a demon. Starting with this bastard.

Naruto reached back and took a Kunai out of his leg holster. His grip on it so tight, it almost seemed that the metal would deform under the stress.

Heavily he pushed himself into a kneeling position, and brought up the Kunai as if to ward off an attack, however, his opponent was still lying where he'd fallen. He was trembling, slightly, with effort of trying to get up. To no avail. Naruto smirked.

Neji looked at him, and screamed with rage and frustration. "WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO ME?!"

Naruto lowered the Kunai, seeing that he wouldn't need it after all. "That… senbon in… your leg…" the words came in gasps, as he realized how much it hurt to talk. "…you're paralyzed…"

Neji's eyes widened, in alarm. _'…poison…'_

"Don't…worry…not…lethal…"

Neji almost sighed in relief, almost. "I…I can't lose…"it was said to himself, but Naruto still heard. And he sighed in exaggerated exasperation. If he could move his arms, he would have smacked himself in the face.

"Look… you can't move…my chakra's sealed…_again_…and I hurt like hell…lets just call it a draw, and have a rematch later…"

Neji looked at him puzzled. _'A rematch…'_

He could see what the blond was doing. Trying to let him save face, and keep his, admittedly, over developed ego intact. There was no choice. He would beat him decisively…it was fate after all. He nodded his assent, and Naruto instantly fell backward, taking in huge gulps of air, as he surrendered to the pain.

After a second of this, he raised his head to address the, similarly disposed Hyuuga. "Now…WHAT THE HELL DID YOU DO TO MY CHAKRA!?"

The answer came from behind him, where he had forgotten all about the rest of Neji's team.

"He forced all of your tenketsu closed, by pushing his own chakra through them. That's what their fighting style does…they attack your body from the _inside_." Gai, now stood over them with a very satisfied look on his face.

He raised his hand in a thumb's up and Naruto was momentarily blinded by the sun glaring off of his teeth. "Naruto-kun…those were truly inspirational battles. I thank you for showing my students, your youthfulness."

Naruto just stared up at him, eye twitching. "Uh…yea…sure…but could you help me fix my chakra?"

The Green Beast, continued to smile at him. "No…normally Neji could do it, but…"

All eyes turned to where Tenten was examining him for injury. "You were great Neji-kun. He had no chance, if it weren't for this lucky shot…" she held up the needle she had taken from his leg. And Neji shook his head at her.

"No…it…it wasn't luck. If anything it was luck that I was able to get _him_ with the 64 palms."

"Neji-kun…"

"He…he beat me…" The last comment wasn't directed towards her, but she heard it nonetheless.

Neji allowed his head to sag backward and Tenten let him rest. She looked back over to the ninja who had, according to Neji, beaten all three of them.

"Hey…how long will he be like this?"

Naruto, who was now sitting up with the help of their sensei, directed his attention briefly to the Hyuuga prodigy. "At least another hour or two."

Gai nodded, and picked the boy up off the ground, despite the squealing protests the action elicited.

"HEY! What are you doing?" In response, Gai also picked up Neji who, surprisingly, didn't even flinch at the action.

"You both require medical treatment, so I shall bear the flames of your youth to the hospital!"

As he was about to leap off, followed by a loud 'YOSH!' from his clone of a student, Naruto began to thrash in his grip, making it difficult for the Jonin to keep a hold of him.

"Wait, what about my puppets!? I can't just leave them here!"

"Not to worry, my youthful friend! Tenten shall collect them and bear them hence to where ever you require them to go."

Tenten nodded and began to gather the discarded weapons, sealing them into a spare storage scroll. "Sure thing, where should I take them?"

Naruto thought about that. He didn't want to leave them in the hands of a relative stranger, even one a friendly as she appeared to be, but really had no choice. "Ok. Let me have Kyu…the fox…" he said indicating the small fury puppet. "…and I guess you can take the rest to Busho's Weapons Shop. Do you know where it is?"

The girl paused as she was picking up the small fox from the ground. "Busho's? Why there?"

"The old man who owns it is a friend, besides he sold me most of the parts for them. Why, you know him?"

Tenten smiled as she handing the puppet to Lee, who would carry it to the hospital. "I should. He's my father."

Naruto's shock was now complete. He was stunned into silence, and, only shook himself out of it when he remembered the only reason he had agreed to the fights in the first place. "Hey! What about my question?"

Gai looked at him with confusion written across his face. "Question?"

Naruto mentally smacked himself. "You agreed to tell me who Kakashi-sensei's Genin Instructor was if I fought all three of your students, remember?!"

Realization dawned and Gai crossed his arms, almost dropping the boy in the process. "Hai, I did agree to that didn't I? Very well my eternal rival's Sensei was none other than Namikaze Minato."

"…"

After all of the fuss, Naruto had expected some kind of major revelation, and was slightly disappointed to find that he'd never heard of the man, but now he had a name, so he could definitely find out more about him, and why he would be interested in him.

Since Naruto had fallen into silence again, Gai took it as a sign he was ready, and took off at a speed that brought tears to the orange clad ninja's eyes towards the hospital.

AN: So there's the latest chapter. Let mwe know what you all think. Next chapter will take us up to the finals.


	12. Chapter 12

Puppets of the Leaf

Ch 12

By Riotv2

Naruto was currently sitting in a hospital bed, fiddling with the senbon shooting mechanism within his fox-like puppet's head. It was a mindless task, something to take up his time, while he thought back over the three intense fights he had just participated in mere hours ago. All of his puppets had preformed beautifully, even his newest puppet, which he had yet to come up with a suitable name for, had, far, surpassed his expectations.

Now he was recovering from his match against Neji, who was also sitting in a bed near the window, waiting for Sakura to finish making an antidote for the paralyzing toxin he had been hit with. Naruto had assured him that he would recover with out it, but the white-eyed boy, was far too impatient. Besides, Naruto got the impression that he made Neji a little uncomfortable.

'_Sore loser…'_

At this point both of their attentions had been drawn to the door, as it slowly opened to reveal the only other member of the Hyuga clan Naruto had ever had any sort of contact with.

"Hinata-chan!"

The girl 'eeped', and went stiff as she met his gaze. She began to press her fingers together and slowly inched her way into the room.

"N…Naruto-kun, N…Neji-ni-san…"

"Ni-san?"

"H…Hai…Neji-ni-san…is…m…my c…cousin."

Naruto had to strain to hear what she was saying. The poor girl had always been pretty shy, and fidgety, though he couldn't figure out why. Still, she seemed nice enough, and she had never treated him badly, nor put down his puppets, and, he had to admit, she had impressed him during the prelims, with her sheer guts.

He definitely counted her among her friends.

"Ohh, I get it, so you just came to visit him?"

"H…Hai…Neji-ni-san…F…father wished…that I inquire…as to when you will be able to…resume…h…helping me…train."

Neji seemed to stiffen at the mention of her father. "I will be able to leave the hospital soon, and then I will report to the compound immediately."

Hinata, nodded, and both boys expected her to turn and leave the room as quickly as possible. So both were, of course, confused when she remained in her place, looking at the ground.

Then Neji understood. "What else does he want to know?"

Hinata seemed to shrink. "He…he wanted to know w..why…y…you were…"

"…why I was sent to the hospital?!"

The edge that had crept into Neji's voice almost seemed to cause Hinata pain, something that Naruto couldn't sit by and let pass.

In response to her question, Neji looked pointedly at his blonde roommate, in time to get hit in the face with Naruto's pillow.

His face burned with anger as he stared at the laughing puppet user.

"Ohh just knock it off Neji. It's not her fault I kicked your butt."

Hinata's gasp was loud enough to hear in the hall.

"I'm not the only one who was put in the hospital…but I'll be glad to make your stay more permanent!" Neji began to rise, and was stopped as the door opened again.

Sakura walked into the room, followed by an older man in a white coat. He had graying hair and small glasses on his nose.

"Now, now…both of you stop that." He had a gentile voice, and was one of the few doctors in the hospital who didn't treat Naruto like a monster. A fact that the boy was highly grateful for with the others around.

He nodded to Sakura, who had filled a syringe with the clear liquid from the vial. She proceeded to inject it into Neji's arm, and within minutes he could feel the lethargy begin to lift off him.

"That should do it." Sakura said confidently. "You can go now if you want. You should be good as new soon enough."

Without even acknowledging anyone else in the room, Neji stormed out. Hinata began to follow him, but stopped as she looked at Naruto. "Um…a…ano…but…what did…um…why…"

Naruto looked at the struggling girl and knew what she wanted to ask.

"He just did something to my chakra system. Some technique that hit me a lot of times all over…um… I think it was called…"

"The sixty-four Palms!?"

All eyes now looked at the white-eyed girl as she stared at Naruto in awe.

"Y…yea… that was it." He absent-mindedly rubbed a small chakra burn on his arm, one of many that he had received as a result of the devastating technique.

Silence reigned in the room for a moment before the doctor took pity on them all.

"Anno, Hinata-sama, but shouldn't you be hurrying along after your cousin. I'm sure that your father is eager to resume your…training."

The mention of the girl's father was enough to snap Hinata out of her stupor. She made her way towards the door, and before closing it after her, paused to take another shy look at the target of her admiration. _'Naruto-kun…he managed to beat Neji-ni-san, even after being hit by 'that' technique.'_

The realization firmly cemented his strength into her mind, even if she already knew he was strong before, now she had something with which to measure herself. She knew full well what that technique did. In fact it had been the sole focus of her training for the first week of the break, followed by the Kaiten.

Both of these techniques were the staple of the Main Branch, even though Neji had somehow learned them both on his own. A fact that had been made painfully clear during their first sparing session.

After the girl had gone, the Doctor shook his head sadly. "That poor girl."

Naruto shifted his attention to the man next to him. "What do you mean?"

"Naruto, Hinata has been going through some very…intense…training with her father and cousin." Sakura stood next to her teammate.

"How intense?"

"…" When no body answered right away, a sense of dread overcame him, and it was over a minute before Sakura could muster up the courage to speak.

"She's been brought to this hospital unconscious three times since the prelims ended."

The shock was so severe it was all he could do to keep from rushing out the door after his friend. The urge to protect his precious people, even from their own fathers, was overwhelming, and the other two in the room could feel it coming off of him clearly in the form of a potent killing intent.

The doctor placed a hand on his shoulder and shook him gently. "Naruto, I understand, but Hinata-sama has asked us not to interfere. She wants to handle the situation with her family on her own, and I agree, albeit reluctantly, that she should."

When they both looked at him for an explanation, he had to remind himself that despite their skills, they were still just emotionally driven teenagers. "You've noticed that she has a certain lack of confidence? Well, taking the full brunt of this training, as she has been, and benefiting from it, will help to prove herself to her family and will also serve to instill a sense of self worth. She needs this to be able to face them on their own terms." He shook his head. "Those kinds of clan politics are always so confusing, and mostly pointless to us outsiders."

After another moment, he again focused on the two children before him and smiled. "Ohh well no use in dwelling on it. Let's take a look at those chakra coils. Sakura…what is the first step in repairing this type of injury?"

She smiled and after a few seals, both hands were covered in a soft greenish blue glow.

Naruto was unsure as to how he should proceed with his training for the remainder of the month. Sakura was continuing her training at the hospital, and flourishing, if the treatment he received from her was any indication. He had been immediately released after she was done, and after the other doctor checked her work on him, pronounced that he could continue training when ever he wished. Sasuke had all but disappeared, but Naruto figured that he would be busy with Kakashi-sensei.

For now, Naruto was on his way to collect his puppets from the old man's shop, where he had asked Tenten to bring them after their fights. As he walked into the building, a bell rang above his head to herald his entry, the old man, Busho, stuck his head out from the back of the shop.

"Ahh Naruto…I've been expecting you." He disappeared for a second, and reappeared with Blade slung over his shoulder. Tenten followed him, with his white-covered new puppet. "I've taken the liberty of repairing the damage to these, I'll put it on your tab, and restocking the weapons in Blade and Kunoichi."

"Thanks, I promise I'll pay you after the exam. I haven't exactly been able to take any missions lately." He smiled sheepishly and rubbed the back of his head.

"Bah, forget it. I know you're good for it." Tenten went back to retrieve Kunoichi from the back room and when she came back to the front with it, she was glaring at Naruto, as if she had just remembered why she had wanted to pummel him when she first saw it.

"Now calm down Tenten. I told you the strategic advantages of that puppet. Naruto didn't have any _other_ _reasons_ in mind when he built it. Did you Naruto?"

Said blonde began to frantically wave his hands before him. "N…no way! She…IT…was just meant to be a distraction that's all, I swear!"

Busho laughed. "It certainly had an effect on the rest of your team."

In a huff, Tenten stomped out of the shop, slamming the door behind her.

Naruto flinched at the bang and the shop owner laughed again. "Don't mind her. She'll get over it. By the way, I've been meaning to ask you who your opponent for the finals will be."

It took him a moment to remember, and when he did, he suddenly became very nervous about the prospect.

"He's from Suna…" At the mention of the Sand village, Busho stopped what he was doing and turned to the boy. "…Sabaku no Kankouro…he…he's a puppet user…like me."

"I see. You watched his fight during the preliminary rounds?"

Naruto nodded.

"How many puppets did he use?"

He thought back over the Suna Nin's fight with Shino. "He only used one. And it didn't look like he had it in a scroll or anything. I think he keeps it bundled up on his back."

Busho nodded. "Ok so it's probably safe to assume that he only had that one with him, if he even has any others at all. Did you see its capabilities?"

Naruto nodded his confirmation. "It used a lot of poison. He even got Shino with it, and had to give him an antidote. It was how he won the match."

"He traded the antidote for the victory? Then it's safe to assume that he'd do it again."

Silence reigned for a moment. "You know…if you could get some of that antidote, then you could eliminate that particular threat…" Naruto's eyes lit up. He knew just who he could ask. Working at a speed that actually impressed the shop owner, Naruto quickly resealed all of his puppets in their scroll, and made his way to the door.

He was about to rush out of the shop, but was stopped by the old man. "Hey, one more thing."

The boy turned in time to catch a small bundle that had been thrown at him. "My daughter told me about her match with you. So I put that together for you, consider it a gift, but…if you don't get promoted, I'm putting it on your tab."

Too excited to even look in the bundle, Naruto took off out the door thanking Busho as he went. The old man just shook his head with a sly grin. _'Give'em hell kid.'_

Naruto stopped at his destination, gasping for breath. He had run all the way there from the weapons shop, which was on the other side of the village. Shakily he reached up and rapped on the door before him. Within moments the door cracked open, and a somber monotone voice spoke out of the opening.

"May I help you…?"

Naruto was just relieved to find that voice wasn't filled with contempt for him, and so eagerly answered.

"Yea…um…is Shino home?"

The final week of the break seemed to fly by for Naruto. He hadn't seen hide nor hair of either of his teammates since paying another visit to the hospital, not as a patient, to see Sakura about something, after his visit with the bug using clan.

Since then he had spent his time training, against his clones, now using three puppets at once, and was getting better about keeping track of them all in the fight. He knew it was just something he could only learn through experience, and so wasn't too hard on himself when he forgot to press an advantage with one while concentrating on the others.

Finally, it was the night before the exams, and Naruto returned home just as the sun was setting, unlike when he would usually fall asleep at the training grounds. Tonight, though, he was determined to get enough sleep so that he could be at his best for the exam. His three consecutive matches against Gai's team had shown him what to expect from the tournament style test, and he knew he'd need all the rest he could get.

As he was about to turn in for the night, he heard a light tapping at his window, and went to see who it was. Most people would be a little wary of someone coming to the widow instead of the door, but in a hidden ninja village like theirs…it was more common place than using the door.

What did surprise him though was finding Kakashi-sensei sitting on the side of the building, reading his book, with his sword leaning up against the wall, at ground level below them.

"K…Kakashi-sensei…?"

"Yo…I wanted to see how your training had progressed."

"It went great, wait till you see my new puppets…"

"I'm sure I'll be pleasantly surprised, Naruto, and I'm glad to see you calling it an early night for once."

"Yea…hey how'd the teme's training go?"

Kakashi smiled beneath his mask. "You'll have to see for yourself. Just remember you don't have to kill each other to win a match. You **are** still teammates."

"Hai, hai, I know that, I won't hurt him too badly."

The comment elicited a slight chuckle from the man. "I heard about your fights with Gai's team. Thanks for not losing; I never would have heard the end of it."

Naruto smiled faintly at the joke. "Hey Sensei…am…am I ready? To become a Chunnin I mean."

Kakashi closed his book. "Naruto…I'll admit that when I first nominated you for the exam, it was so you three could gain the experience. Rookie teams who are entered rarely get promoted in their first exams."

Naruto's shoulders fell as if he'd been expecting that answer.

"More than that though…my own sensei nominated us as rookies, and I was promoted, but we all grew so much from the experience. We learned so much from the exam, that my teammates never regretted going through it. You've already gotten much stronger as a result right?"

This lifted Naruto's spirits slightly, but it was the mention of Kakashi's sensei that reminded him of a question he had been wondering about since overhearing the Jonin talking to the memorial of hero's.

"What was he like…your sensei?"

Kakashi smirked under his mask. "Minato-sensei was a great man…a hero to everyone in the village. He was greatly feared by his enemies, and loved by those who called him friend."

Kakashi seemed to draw in on himself while he talked.

"What kind of ninja was he? What did he specialize in?"

Kakashi quirked his eye at the boys question. _'Could he…no there's no way he could know about sensei.'_

"He was a ninjutsu type. He specialized in using common jutsu in surprising ways, and he was always creating new jutsu. He was truly unpredictable."

Naruto smiled, he liked the man already.

"How did he die?"

Kakashi hesitated. "He died protecting the village…from the Kyuubi."

Slowly, Naruto's hand went to his stomach, as it often did whenever someone mentioned his prisoner.

"I'm…I'm sorry sensei…"

Kakashi looked at him squarely. "Why? You didn't attack the village. Naruto I know that a lot of the village chooses to blame you since it's the closest they can get to punishing the demon… but always remember…you are not the demon fox. You are the one who is keeping him from getting out and attacking again."

Naruto nodded. He knew what Kakashi was saying was true, but still…he felt sad for the loss of not only Kakashi's own sensei, but also Iruka-sensei's parents. When he was young he lived in a very crowded orphanage. How many of those children were there because of the monster sealed within him.

As he thought this his hand balled up into a fist and he felt a distinct anger which he hoped the demon could feel.

"Don't worry sensei…this monster will never harm our village again. I promise."

Kakashi nodded. This wasn't what he had intended by coming here. He just wanted to see that his students were as prepared for tomorrow as they could be. Before he took his leave he thought about Naruto's first match.

"I never doubted that. Ohh, I know I haven't been much help to you in your training…" He held up a hand to forestall the protest from leaving Naruto's lips. "…however I have some advice for you if you want to hear it? Tomorrow you are going to be fighting Suna's puppeteer right?"

Naruto nodded.

"I've done some checking up on him. He's supposed to be their newest prodigy when it comes to puppets, and it is hopped that he will revitalize the art in Suna. He follows the traditions of the Puppet Corps very closely." Kakashi's words weren't exactly instilling confidence in his student. "That is his weakness."

"Huh? W…weakness?"

"Naruto you have been studying the puppetry techniques of Suna for a long time…you know how they fight. So why not show him how a puppeteer of the Leaf fights."

Naruto's eyebrows came together as he started to understand.

Kakashi stood up, which now put him completely horizontal on the wall.

"Naruto…the most dangerous type of ninja are the ones you cannot predict."

With that he, and his sword, vanished.

Naruto closed the window and sat on his bed. His eyes wandered to the large stack of scrolls sitting on a shelf across the room, the only semblance of cleanliness in the room.

He started thinking back on everything he had ever read about the tactics of a puppeteer.

"'…One you cannot predict…'" He had heard something similar, once, back when they had first encountered Zabuza in the Wave.

"_That 'bake' is the Leafs number one unpredictable knuckleheaded ninja…"_

Naruto rose from his bed and took one of his new scrolls of the stack. The one detailing a theory that Chiyo had come up with. A fox-like grin appeared on his face.

"He'll never expect this."

In a blur of movement, Naruto grabbed Blade, and his toolbox and set to work.

AN: ok this was a very short filler chapter, but I thought it was important to get that scene with Kakashi in. Sorry it's been so long, but my computers been down for a while.

What did you all think of his fight with Orochimaru in the last chapter? Please Read and Review.

Next Chapter: The finals begin!! We see the results of everyone's training. I'm especially looking forward to the reactions to Garra vs. Hinata. _*grins evilly*_


	13. Chapter 13

Puppets of the Leaf:

Ch 13

By Riotv2

_*Knock…Knock…BANG!!*_

"NARUTO!!! C'mon it's time to go or you'll be late!"

The pounding on the front door of Naruto's apartment only increased from there, as the blonde picked himself up off of the floor where he had apparently fallen asleep the night before.

Slowly, much to the anger of the screaming person who had been making the racket, he made his way to the door, trying to rub the sleep from his eyes while he went. When he lifted the latch on the doors lock with a click, which seemed to be unusually loud in the morning hours, the door was suddenly kicked inward by a very unhappy pink haired girl.

"Baka! Do you have any idea what time it is?!" The girl stormed into the room and loomed over the sleepy boy who had been knocked to the ground.

"S…Sakura…AHHH I'M LATE!" Quickly he scrambled up and into his room, presumably to get dressed.

"You have exactly 30 minutes to get there, Naruto, so hurry up!"

As she looked around the small room which served as his kitchen/dining room/living room, the girl realized that it was the first time she had ever been in her teammates home before.

"What happened? I thought you were going to go to bed early last night." She called out as she heard a crashing noise come from what she assumed to be his bedroom.

"Yea I know…but I got caught up in something…where the hell is…ohh." he called back and she suppressed a giggle at his antics.

Carefully she examined the objects spread out on the table before her, scattered tools, and a mostly used up spool of wire, along with some wood shavings. And on the ground beside the table she found a mostly naked attractive blonde female, sprawled out on its side.

'_What the hell did he get caught up in!?'_

She recognized the puppet for what she…it…was, having seen it a on quite a few occasions, so decided not to kill him over it…this time, despite the fact that it's very existence, was demeaning to women, and kunoichi in particular, she had never seen him doing anything perverted with it, and had actually seen him become angry at the insinuation.

Now that she looked closely at the puppet, she realized just how lifelike it was, aside from the holes on its hands and thighs she could easily mistake it for a living person.

In fact it almost made her envious of it's…development…then wondered how exactly Naruto knew so much about women to be able to mimic one so…perfectly…there was even a strange birthmark on it's shoulder.

'_Could he…nahh.'_

Behind her a door shut, and she turned to see a small puff of smoke dissipating around him in his usual orange jumpsuit. _'UGG when is he going to get rid of that thing.'_

"What was that?"

Naruto just looked at her blankly. "What?

"The smoke…never mind. Ready?"

Naruto nodded excitedly as he replaced Kunoichi's bow and resealed her into its scroll.

"Yup let's go…by the way, I appreciate the wake up call, but what made you come?"

Sakura shrugged, as they made their way out the door. "Kakashi-sensei asked me to make sure you were on time, while he went to get Sasuke-kun."

"Ohh." Briefly his thoughts drifted back to his conversation last night with his teacher, but he quickly shook them from his mind as he focused on what would lay ahead.

Naruto and Sakura finally made their way to the Stadium where the final exam would be taking place. All around citizens of Konoha and ninja alike were crowding the spectator entrances, trying to get a good seat. On the wall of the massive stone building, a large poster depicted the first round matchups. There were other people crowded around those making bets on the outcomes.

Sakura escorted him to the participant entrance, and then hit him lightly on the shoulder. "Well good luck Naruto." As she turned to leave, Naruto called after her to stop.

"Hey, would you hold on to this for me until after the exam?" He held out the long scroll which had been attached to his back. "It's that giant puppet I told you guys about. I probably won't need it for this."

Sakura took it skeptically, still not totally convinced that he had actually built something like what he claimed. "Sure. Now get in there, you're just in time."

With a last wave to his teammate, Naruto ran into the Stadium to join the other finalists.

The first thing he noticed was that, while all of the ninja were divided by their respective villages, one raven-haired ninja from his own village was even standing apart from their old classmates.

That thought stopped Naruto in his tracks as he looked over each of his friends. Immediately he burst out laughing, drawing everyone's attention to him.

"Hey Naruto, _*munch munch* _what's so funny?" Choji asked him around a mouth full of chips.

"It's just…how many Leaf Genin entered this exam?"

'_Troublesome…'_ "Around ten teams worth, not counting the rookies…why?"

His laughter erupted anew, and he had to wait a minute before he could answer. "It's just…out of thirteen teams of Genin, only the rookies even made it this far!" Despite his continued laughter, everyone else had fallen silent to think about that.

The silence was short lived however as a slight chuckle was heard from the last source any of them had expected it to. Sasuke made no attempts to hide the fact that he had found the comment funny, and soon all of the other Leaf ninja were also laughing. While the three sand siblings, and the lone sound ninja, all stood there staring at them.

"I don't know what they find so funny…" The now recovered sound girl scoffed. "…it doesn't say much for their village that all of their experienced ninja were outclassed as they were."

"It does say much about them, however." Both Kankouro and Temari backed away from their younger brother slowly. The fact that he had chosen to comment on the strength of their opponents made it clear that he intended to kill them all.

Their musings were interrupted by the appearance of a Jonin, who was chewing on a senbon of all things. Naruto looked at it and briefly considered trying it with one of his before he remembered that they were coated with toxin.

"Ok everyone, the finals are about to begin, and the Hokage is going to give a speech in a moment, but I need to explain how this is going to work."

Naruto took up a position next to his teammate, who was wearing a new look. His arms were covered in bandages, and had on a high-necked collar, presumably to hide the mark on his shoulder.

"The rules will be the same as the preliminary rounds, one on one, no time limit, you win if you knock out your opponent, capture him, or kill him, though I'll try to step in before that happens. If you lose you are eliminated from the tournament, however even if you lose in the first round, there is still a chance that you can be promoted, likewise if you're the last one standing at the end, you might not be promoted. So just do your best to impress the two judges." He pointed a thumb over his shoulder at the two chunin from before the first round. "This is no time to hold back on your skills. Give it your all. Any questions?...no? good."

He turned to face the Kage's Box at the top of the arena and bowed, his signal that they were all ready.

As promised, the Third went into a long speech about the exams fostering friendship among the villages. Naruto, once again, heard none of it.

He was currently sizing up not only the foreign ninja, but his own friends as well. Shikamaru and Choji didn't seem to have changed at all, while Hinata, whom he hadn't seen since the hospital, was still wearing the same coat, but she now had on a pair of fingerless gloves, and she almost appeared to be standing straighter, more confidently, however that all disappeared when she caught him looking at her. She visibly withdrew inward, and her face turned a light shade of red. He also saw her arms tense up as if she was visibly fighting the urge to do something.

While he was happy to see her coming out of her, weird, shell, he wanted to know just what kind of 'training' she had been put through, and if it was as bad as Sakura had described, however even he knew that it would be rude to just ask. He'd just have to wait for her match and see.

The Hokage finished his speech and the Jonin, who had introduced himself as Genma, called out the first match. "Uchiha Sasuke and Sabaku no Temari, remain here, the rest of you proceed up the stairs to the competitors box."

As they all made their way towards the door, Naruto stopped near his teammate. "Good luck Teme. Don't lose until we get a chance to fight."

Sasuke looked at him and smirked. "Just worry about yourself. You'd better not embarrass the Leaf against that other 'doll' user."

The jibe at Naruto's puppets was obviously in good humor, so he let it slide, for now anyway, later though he'd probably make him pay.

He made his way up to the box with the others and found that the Sands puppeteer was walking towards him. "Hey, Uzumaki, I've been meaning to ask…where did you learn to use puppets?"

Naruto shook his head. "Sorry can't tell you. Not even my teams Jonin Instructor knows."

Kankouro was now confused. "So wait, you _can't_ tell me or you _won't_?"

"Both. Sorry, but I made a promise to keep it a secret."

The larger boy crossed his arms in a huff. "You know what I think? Maybe my Sensei was right…I think there's a Leaf spy in our village, and he stole it from us. What else did he steal for you?!" the boy was getting angry.

Understandable, given what Kakashi had told him, about the Suna nin. His dream was to revitalize the Puppet Corps to their former glory. Seeing the technique used in another village…he had every right to be angry.

"Listen…if we had stolen the technique from Suna, do you think the Hokage would have let me enter the exam, knowing your team was here? It would be an act of war."

Kankouro seemed to think on that for a second then visibly shook it off. "When we fight…I'll make you tell me where you learned my technique."

With that the boy went back to his younger sibling and Naruto made his way to the railing to watch Sasuke's fight, which was already in full swing.

Currently, Sasuke was displaying an impressive agility as he jumped, sidestepped and generally, avoided the large metal fan that was being wielded by the angry Suna Kunoichi. His strategy was simple, and obvious; she was a long range fighter, so get her into close range. The strait forward tactic appeared to be working, every time she tried to create some distance, he would move with her, even while avoiding her attacks.

What was surprising his two teammates, however, was the fact that Sasuke hadn't even tried to attack her back yet. He was relying on an almost aggressive defense. Sasuke had never before displayed this level of…patience.

He was steadily pushing her back towards the wall of the arena, and she could find no way to avoid it. Finally Sasuke seemed to falter and sidestepped to the wrong side allowing her to hop backward, so that she was near the wall. As soon as she managed to break away, Sasuke began a short series of hand seals, and exhaled a large ball of fire at her. "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu!"

Temari looked at the jutsu and smiled. With a twist of her wrist the fan opened to its fullest and she swept it through the air before her, creating a powerful wind. The two attacks met and the added wind and oxygen turned the large fireball into a smoldering maelstrom, and a follow up wind from the girls fan reversed the direction it was traveling, sending it back at the waiting Uchiha 'prodigy'.

The devastating counter was obvious to anyone who had ever seen the girl fight before, which Sasuke had, so it came as a shock, to those who knew him, that the 'rookie of the year' would make such a basic mistake.

Everyone watching the match, mostly Konoha citizens, held their breath as the inferno enveloped the Uchiha heir. And for a few agonizing seconds the entire crowd waited patiently for the fire to burn it self out.

When the fires, finally, abated, all that remained was a burnt, smoking, circle in the center of the arena. However, there was no trace of the Uchiha. Temari began to cast her gaze around the battleground, searching for her opponent, and nearly missed the small crack that had appeared in the ground before her…almost.

With a grin she closed her fan and prepared to bring it down on the head of the Leaf nin as he emerged from the ground, however it was instantly grabbed from behind by a strong hand as it broke through the surface of the wall, followed by the upper half of Sasuke's body as he placed a kunai at her throat.

The girl gritted her teeth in frustration. She had been caught completely by surprise by the move, and she franticly searched for a way to escape. Then she saw it, he was still halfway embedded into the wall. She pushed against said wall with her legs and let go of the fan she held, as she twisted, kicked off and away from him, the Kunai leaving a small cut across her neck.

The force she applied to the, already crumbling wall caused it to break up and he fell into a roll, coming up in a crouched ready position, holding her own fan before him.

She came to a similar position, except she held up only her empty hands. Looking at her, Sasuke smirked and stood up, resting the large weapon on his shoulder, marveling at its surprising weight, suddenly glad that he hadn't been hit by it.

He never took his eyes off of her as he turned slightly towards the hole he had made in the wall, which now revealed a small man-sized tunnel that extended under the ground. With a large arrogant smirk on his face he let the large fan drop into the tunnel out of sight, and out of her reach. The shock written across Temari's face was soon replaced by anger as she let out a low growl.

"I'm guessing that you've trained with that weapon for most of your life. Which means that without it…well you would have lost even with it."

Without waiting for her response Sasuke ran at her, intending to end the match with one more attack, however he didn't anticipate, the small, normal sized, fan she had pulled from within her waist band. Nor the small, but powerful wind attack that came from it.

Still, rather than try to dodge, Sasuke simply leapt strait into it, and was just above her when the blades of wind hit him full in the chest and caused him to erupt into a small inferno, which was fed by the wind, as it engulfed her.

She had managed to throw up her arms first, using the small, now destroyed fan to keep most of the flames off of her head however she still received major burns over most of her body.

The ground near the wall, where the crack had formed before, slowly began to fall inwards, as Sasuke, the real Sasuke, climbed out from under the ground. "Katon Bunshin…"

With that smirk still plastered on his face, he walked towards the girl and was about to deliver a final kick to her head, when he was stopped by Genma. "That's it! The match is over. WINNER: UCHIHA SASUKE!"

With a final look at the girl, Sasuke walked back up to the stands to a thunderous applause rising from the crowd.

As he saw what his teammate intended to do, Naruto ran down to meet him on the stairs, and caught him near the bottom. "Hey, Teme! What was that about?! You had already won…"

Sasuke didn't acknowledge his remark, and only paused near Naruto for a moment. "Don't lose…I'm fighting you next."

Naruto watched him retreat back up to the fighter's area, but couldn't follow as the next match was announced.

"Sabaku no Kankouro Vs. Uzumaki Naruto…"

The blonde boy turned and looked back and forth at the door to the arena and the back of his teammate. He wanted to confront Sasuke about his actions, but knew that he'd be disqualified of he didn't go out there. "This isn't over Teme!"

From up in the Hokage's box, the Third was livid about the action of his Gennin, and turned to the Kazekage to apologize, only for the words to get cut off in his throat when he saw the Sands Kage wasn't even paying attention to the match.

"Is something wrong Kazekage-san? That was your daughter that just fought, correct?"

"Hmmm…ohh yes it was, but I'm afraid I didn't really expect her to win against your Uchiha, skilled though she is, it was just a bad match up."

"I…see..."

Sarutobi Sasuke frowned at the demeanor of the other Kage, but was brought from his musings as a chunin handed him a report from the medics on the status of the girl.

"I see, my medic team reports that she will need to be off her feet for a few days, but she will make a full recovery. She is welcome to remain in the leaf while she recovers of course…"

"I thank you, Hokage-dono. For your generosity as well as your hospitality."

"It is no problem…… You did the same for us the last time the exams were being held in Suna…remember?"

The Kazekage hesitated for a split second. "Yes, of course, but thank you all the same…"

"…_Sabaku-no-Kankouro Vs. Uzumaki Naruto…"_

"Tell me Hokage-dono, this Uzumaki…Is it true he fights with puppets?"

Sarutobi smiled a grandfatherly smile. "Ohh yes…I realize that the technique is of your village, but let me assure you…"

He was interrupted by the Kazekage waving his arm between them. "Please do not worry about it…I know that you didn't steal the technique maliciously, the basics of the technique are simple enough to emulate. Besides it is a dying art I'm afraid, there hasn't been a true Puppet master in Suna since Sasori of the Red Sands."

The third nodded to him self. "Still…I am interested to see how he matches up against my son…this should be interesting."

As the two puppeteers stood face to face, Genma looked back and forth between the two. _'wow…talk about tension…'_ "Ok…you both remember the rules… Begin!"

As one, both combatants leapt backwards into the trees that lined the arena, those few that survived the last match intact, and were hidden from view. Still in the center of the stadium, Genma looked around and let out a dejected sigh. _'…just great…this could take a while…'_

….

Kankuro, sat huddled in the dense cover of a tree, going over what he knew of the loudmouthed blonde that had the nerve to either copy or steal the puppet technique from his village. _'…the only puppets I've seen him use are the cloaked one from the prelims, and that fox one…but he had a third scroll on his leg then, so he probably has as many as three…good thing I had Baki-sensei send me another one when he went back to the village.'_

Silently he unraveled Crow from the bandages on his back and took a scroll from his sleeve, rather than unseal it though, he set it down in the crux of a branch and scanned the area for any sign of the orange jumpsuit that the kid insisted on wearing.

'…_where are you…ahhh…'_

Strait out in front of him, almost directly across the arena, he could just see a small orange blur dart from a tree trunk to the one next to it.

Kankuro smiled and sent a Kunai, with an exploding tag attached to it, out of Crows mouth and strait at the tree Naruto was hiding in.

The weapon hit the trunk of the tree and exploded, taking a good chunk of the wood with it, and sending Naruto flying out into the open, where he landed in a heap. When the blond didn't get up, Kankuro sent Crow up out of the tree he was in and had it fly, joints clanking eerily, over his opponent, and sprayed him with poison gas.

Now knowing he had the blond where he wanted him, Kankuro dropped from his hiding place and slowly walked towards the leaf nin, over whom Crow was still standing, just in case he tried something.

"Tsk…tsk…don't you know the first thing about puppet tactics? _Rule One: Always control your puppet from cover…_Let me tell you, that orange thing you're wearing is a good way to get kil…huh?!"

The boys rant was cut off by a senbon sliding past his head. As he leapt backward he forced Crow to stab the prone Naruto with a long metal spike which had extended out of its hand. The body didn't move.

'_Crap, a fake?!'_

He pulled his puppet close to him, now too exposed to try and move to some cover. He had been effectively lured out of hiding, and he wasn't naïve enough to think that Naruto was in the same place his attack had originated from.

"What was that you were saying about _cover_?" The voice seemed to be coming from all over the arena, so he couldn't pinpoint his location.

'_Shit! That's a skill only the senior members of the Corps can use…where the hell did he learn it?!'_

"Come out and face me you thieving bastard!"

"Rule Two: Never panic in the face of an enemy…"

Kankuro gritted his teeth in anger. With a twitch of his fingers, two of crows hands opened at the wrist, and he began to shoot out several smoke bombs all over the arena, in an attempt to create some cover for him to hide in.

He never had a chance to move, as an orange blur barreled into him from behind, sending them both rolling across the ground, while crow collapsed.

When Kankuro got a look at him, he could clearly see a small puncture hole in Naruto's chest, from where he had been stabbed by Crow. The 'wound' wasn't bleeding.

'_He made a puppet replica of himself?'_

To be sure that it wasn't the real Naruto, who had disguised himself as a puppet during the prelims, Crow came at him from behind and stabbed two of the spikes into his back.

'Naruto', recoiled from the impact slightly, and then snapped his arm up towards Kankuro and an arrow shot out of the hole that was visible in the blonde's palm.

The arrow, while it didn't have much in the way of power behind it, still managed to at least reach its target, as Kankuro ducked aside. He glared at the puppet, becoming angry at the blonds, basic, tactics. There was barely any strategy, and yet Kankuro was stuck in a tight spot, facing a hidden enemy, that had caught him out in the open, and still the blond refused to press the attack. _'He's playing with me…'_

"What the hell are you waiting for?! If you were a REAL puppeteer this match would've ended the moment I got caught in the open!"

"I'm waiting for you to get serious." Again the voice answered from all around.

"What…"

"I am the only person in this village who uses puppets…and from what I've been told, there aren't too many left in Suna either."

"Just what the hell are you getting at?!"

"Look around…it's not just my village watching us…there are people from Suna here too, the Daimyo's, merchants, travelers, they're all here to see us fight…If we're ever going to have a chance to show what a Puppet user can do, it's right now."

Kankuro took a good long look at the stands around him, and knew that the bastard was right.

"What if we died tomorrow…chances are our art would die with us."

Kankuro looked at his puppet for a moment and then turned sharply as Naruto's voice came from directly behind him.

"What do you say…Lets showed what puppet users are _really _made of."

Despite himself, Kankuro found the kids enthusiasm addictive. He called his puppet back to himself, and took a ready stance as Naruto did the same with his puppet copy.

"OK, Baka, lets see if you can back up that talk."

With a smirk, Naruto brought his hands together again, his puppet mimicking the movement, and their appearance began to waver slightly.

'_An illusion…'_

Both the boy and puppet was consumed by puffs of smoke as a jutsu was released, revealing Naruto, no longer dressed in his orange jumpsuit, but a long sleeved black shirt, with an thin orange trim running around his high collar and down one arm to wrap around his right wrist in an intricate fire pattern. The sleeves were loose, better for concealing his actions. He also wore slightly short dark grey pants with black sandals.

His new clothing was barely noticed as Kankuro stared openmouthed at the mostly nude blond girl next to his opponent, while blood began to flow freely down his nose. From all around them, came the noises of men falling out of their seats mixed with the angry shouts of, what seemed to be every woman in the arena.

From her position in the front row, which she had insisted upon to show her support for her only female student, one kunoichi merely stared at the scantily clad puppet before her, Her gaze had come to rest on it's right shoulder, and her red eyes narrowed dangerously at the small blossom shaped birthmark. _'What…what the HELL!!!'_

Naruto smiled gleefully at the reaction he had gotten from the crowd. Kankuro had barely recovered his cognitive faculties, when Kunoichi produced a long bow from…well somewhere…and pointed a loaded arrow at the boy. The action shook him from his stupor as he registered the movement.

'_crap!'_

The arrow was released, and it hit Crow in the center of its chest as he barely got it in front of him. The Suna nin let out a sigh of relief.

'_That was definitely a henge on that puppet, but how?'_

Puppets were not alive, and didn't have any chakra to mold for a jutsu of any kind. _'…except for 'those' kinds of puppets…'_

Naruto continued to fire arrows at Kankuro, who continued to let them hit his puppet, while it surged towards the two, forcing both Naruto and Kunoichi to back petal away from it to keep the range that gave his puppet the advantage. Suddenly Crow shot up above them, and Naruto sent Kunoichi up to intercept the attack he was sure would come, only for her to be intercepted by a large figure that had leapt out of the trees.

The figure wore a torn cape similar to Kankuro's other puppet. Its torso had expanded, and enclosed around Kunoichi, trapping her inside its body. Naruto felt his strings get severed from the puppet as soon as the body closed, and instantly grabbed two more scrolls, one from his leg and the other from his hip pouch.

Kankuro let out a sigh. "Was that a…a human puppet?"

Naruto, who had begun to summon his next two puppets, paused. "A what?"

"That…that girl… was she ever alive?"

Naruto didn't know what to make of the question. "N…no…"

"But she looks so…real."

Now Naruto understood the confusion. "Ohh that…simulated flesh. We sometimes use it to test out weapons or jutsu to see what kind of damage it would do."

Kankuro barely registered the words as two more puffs of smoke erupted from the two scrolls the kid had taken out. Now coming strait at him, was another puppet, the one he had seen the boy use in the preliminary rounds, and tried to maneuver his own new puppet into it's path in an attempt to 'capture' it as well.

However when it tried to open its torso, another figure appeared in front of it, this one completely covered in white, except for a metal plate covering its face emblazoned with the Leaf symbol.

The puppet threw out its arms and they wrapped around the entire puppet, trapping Ant's arms at its side, and keeping its chest closed. To the Suna puppeteer, it looked like a long white rope had ensnared his puppet.

Both of them were pulled to the ground again, as Blade flew over their heads, right towards him, only to be intercepted by Crow. His two puppets were designed to be used in conjunction with each other, but the unusual abilities of Naruto's new creation had effectively separated them. So, shifting his concentration solely over to Crow, he began to try and maneuver his first puppet around Blade, to make a direct attack against its controller.

Finally, after a few moments, Crow charged right at Blade, with its four arms reaching out, each with a thin blade affixed to its palm. As the two puppets came within range of each other, Blade took a swipe at Crow, severing three of its four arms however the damaged puppet, continued past its opponent, and headed strait at Naruto.

Halfway through its charge it was intercepted by a large mass of wood and fabric, in the form of Ant. Kankuro cursed as he had forgotten the other puppets in his haste to finish the fight. Frantically he looked around for the white puppet, which must have thrown Ant to intercept Crow. However it was nowhere to be seen, neither could he find Blade, now that he thought of it. So be brought his hands together, in an attempt to replace himself with a tree branch, but as his hands met, two more, white gloved ones burst out of the ground and wrapped around his, while Blade came falling down from above in attempt to capture him and end the match.

Though, while he could no longer form hand seals, he could still move his fingers enough to cause Crows head to launch at Naruto. The attack caught the blonde off guard long enough for him to shake loose of his white bindings, and hop away from Blade, while Naruto rolled out of the way of the head, which had produced another needle like blade from its mouth.

Both boys had to continue to dodge the attack of the other, while trying to direct the actions of their own puppets. During all of this, Kankuro had managed to bring the rest of crow, albeit in pieces, back into the fight, and now had all four of its arms, as well as the head going after his opponent, each with a poisoned blade on it, while Naruto still had blade trying to hit him with its own limbs, and the white arms, which were still extending from under ground, continued to try and trip him up.

The fight had now reached so many fronts that quite a few of those watching, Genma included, had difficulty keeping up.

Finally, after a few minutes, Naruto was caught in the back of his feet by a stray leg, and began to fall backward. At the same moment, one of the stretched out arms, caught a hold of Kankuro's foot and he too lost his balance. Capitalizing on each others predicament, one of Crows arms, cut into Naruto's forearm, while Blades 'mask' opened, shooting out several Senbon which all hit Kankuro's leg.

Suddenly, the fight came to a screeching halt, both boys found themselves in a situation that would normally mean the end of the match.

Now Genma, who had been ready to call the match over when he saw Naruto get hit with the poisoned weapon, stopped when he also saw Kankuro struck with the senbon.

"I've got you Uzumaki! That poison will kill you in a matter of minutes…but…"

"Let me guess…you'll give me the antidote if I quit right?"

Genma took a step back, interested as to where this would go.

"That's right…I've only got one antidote with me…and if you don't quit I'll destroy it." Kankuro had the look of a man assured of victory as he held out a small vial of clear liquid.

Naruto laughed. "Go ahead." Kankuros face fell and became angry.

'_Fine! Have it your way…'_ His hand squeezed and the vial shattered, pouring the contents on the ground. The Suna nin watched his opponent carefully, expecting for him to be in shock. He wasn't. In fact he seemed…amused.

"What the hell is so funny?! Don't you realize you're going to die?"

For a brief second Kankuro's attention was diverted to the stands where a few people had cheered at the prospect, they however were silenced, by one crazy pink haired girl nearly breaking the neck of the one closest to her.

The reaction confused him, but the thought was tossed aside as he saw Naruto plunge a small object into his leg. After a second, he withdrew it and tossed it over to the boy. When he caught it a look of horror crossed his face.

"No…there's no way…you…you couldn't possibly have…" his hands began to tremble so badly his dropped the empty syringe.

The strength left his legs and he fell forward, landing hard on the ground.

"W…what the hell is this?!"

"You already used that trick during the prelims. Remember…you poisoned a friend of mine."

In the stands, next to Kiba and Kurenai, Shino sneezed, causing his teammate to gasp at him. The reaction was ignored.

"Long story short…he still had a few drops of the antidote you gave him…enough for another friend to make more for me."

Kankuro had now lost all feeling in his legs, and the numbing feeling was slowly creeping up his waist.

"What did you do to…"

"Don't worry, unlike you, I don't use lethal poisons. You'll be fine in a day or two."

Genma shook his head, with a small smile. "Winner…Uzumaki Naruto!"

Surprisingly there were quite a few cheers as Naruto collected his and Kankuro's puppets, while the medics came to collect the paralyzed boy.

Before they could take him away though, Naruto walked over to them, carrying both Crow and Ant. "Hey don't worry about these two ok? I'll keep an eye on them until the exam is over. Then I'll bring them by the hospital for you."

His smile was incredibly disarming, but Kankuro couldn't bring himself to return it. Despite all that had happened, all that was about to happen…he had a grudging respect for the boy. He knew what he was about to do would likely mean his execution, but he needed to.

"Hey…do me a favor…be careful when…when you fight your next opponent. Just stay alive."

Naruto looked at him strangely as Kankuro was carried off towards the medical area.

'_I'm sorry Uzumaki…'_

"Well Kazekage-dono? I hope you are satisfied with the match between our two puppet users?"

"Yes it was a most…interesting match."

"I admit that I've seen very few shinobi use the technique, other than Naruto of course, but I must say that your son shows great potential for the art."

"Quite so…The Corps are looking to him to revive the technique within the village."

The Kazekage had not met his gaze at all since the tournament began. He continued to stare down into the arena, and hadn't shown the least bit if unrest that so far two of the three Suna Ninja left in the exam, his own children no less, had been defeated by Leaf Genin.

"I am sorry that the Otokage could not be here. I would have liked to finally meet with him face to face…have you by any chance?"

The question, innocent enough on the surface, prompted a reaction from the Kazekage, even if it was only a slight inclination of his head, the movement, and subsequent pause afterward, spoke volumes to the Third.

"No…I have not had the pleasure…but it is to be expected with a new village…so much paper work."

Sarutobi nodded with a slight chuckle at the private joke that was always shared by Kages of all villages. The amount of paper work for any Kage was staggering.

"Tell me, your other son…Garra is it?... I have heard accounts of him from the second part of the exam, and again during the preliminary round, how do you think he will match up against a Hyuga?"

The Kazekage turned his head marginally to the right meeting Sarutobi's gaze for the first time. "I am far more interested in his inevitable fight against your Uchiha."

"Man, what a drag…"

Shikamaru had been 'fighting' against the sound girl for only a few minutes, and already he had tried to quit, though it was before the exam, and Naruto had forced him to hop over the railing with his strings. He could have resisted of course, but it would have required way too much effort.

So now he knelt lazily under the shade of one of the trees, defecting senbon needles lazily with a kunai while he watched the clouds. He had noticed that the needles all had bells attached to them, and strings attached to those, which he had cut while deflecting them all.

From the very moment he entered the ring he already had figured out over seventy ways to defeat this girl, though the easiest was just to wait until the sun had set enough for him to stretch his shadow all over the arena. So that's what he was doing, besides, the girl had to be running out of weapons.

"ARRGG! What is with this guy…It's like he doesn't even care about this fight!" Kin ignored the chuckle that came from the proctor of this exam, at her expense.

Kin fought down the urge to throttle the man, mostly because it would get her disqualified, and partly because he could, in all likelihood, kick her ass.

Instead, she took out her last few remaining senbon, holding them in both hands, and threw them all at once towards the lazy leaf nin.

Shikamaru simply scoffed at the attempt and leapt strait, up into the surrounding trees, knocking one of the projectiles away at the same time. An instant later, he dropped back down in the same spot, and breathed out an annoyed sigh. "How troublesome…are we done yet?"

Kin gritted her teeth so hard that Genma could have sworn that he heard one of them crack under the pressure. Violently, she brought her hands together and channeled a lot of chakra down the strings she had attached to that last volley, when the energy reached the bells attached to the strings, everything went deathly quite, as if all of the sound had been sucked up into a vacuum. Only to be replaced an instant later by a high pitched 'BANG', which not only covered the immediate area in a short lived cloud of dust, but also tore the trees apart where they stood close to the center of the blast.

The loud sound seemed to resonate with the bells that littered the area from her earlier attacks, and the noise level only grew, sending practically everyone in the stands into a fit of deafness, and in some cases, blood loss due to ruptured eardrums. Even the two Kages had to rub a distinct ringing out of their ears.

Genma, for his part had both hands clamped to the sides of his head, with blood leaking out between his fingers, and his mouth opened, in a silent scream of pain.

When the shockwave settled enough to tolerate, Kin removed two unusual looking plugs from her ears, and smiled in satisfaction as the Proctor dealt with the aftermath of the attack.

Above the ring, in the Hokage's private box, both Kages stared in apparent horror at the carnage that had just been unleashed below them.

The Kazekage, narrowed his eyes at the girl and for a moment lost a bit of control over his Killing Intent. It wasn't much, but it had gotten the attention of the Third.

"That fool…" It was barely a whisper on the Sand Shadows lips, but still the third had picked up on it.

"I agree. That was a highly reckless move. It looks as though many of the spectators have been injured."

The last was said to the Hokage's aid, who, had disappeared to alert all available medical staff to begin assisting the civilians.

The Kazekage, who apparently hadn't even noticed that he had been overheard, was silently planning ways to punish the girl, but in the end decided to give her first to the rest of the men in his village, and to offer what was left to Manda as a sacrifice. _'She had better pray that she doesn't survive what is to come.'_

Kin stalked her way over to the pile of rubble that had been the spot where her opponent had been crouching. She was breathing a bit heavily from the amount of chakra she had used, but other wise she wasn't in that bad of shape. She was eager to look down on what was left of the boy that been mocking her since she entered the ring. But after a moment of kicking around some of the debris, she became worried that she could find any trace. The last time she had used that technique, it had made an awful mess of the person who had been caught in the middle like that, as far as she knew there was still a blood stain.

But now there was nothing, she began to look all around her in a panic, and caught a slight movement out of the corner of her vision. Instantly she began to back flip away from the area, and had to continue, until she was almost flush against the far wall on the still sunny side of the arena.

When she came to a stop, she looked at the ground, and about fifteen feet away from her, sat a dark pointed line that was trembling with what she took to mean exertion.

'_That bastard, tried to catch me in his shadow…'_

As the shadow began to retract, she began to scan the darkened side of the ring, for her opponent, who had apparently survived her trump card well enough for him to manage his own attack.

Still she could find no trace of him, when she suddenly fell under a heavy shadow. Quickly she glanced upward towards the sky, to see a large fan being held up by the wind, and in place by a long string, as if it was a kite.

'_Shit! A distract…!!!'_

She was unable to finish her thought, because she suddenly was unable to move.

Very much against her will, her gaze was directed towards the wall opposite where she was standing to see the string, extending from a large hole in the wall. Through which Shikamaru stepped holding said string. Calmly, almost lazily, he began to walk towards the girl, while at the same time she was walking towards him.

Franticly she began to go over how he had managed to get away from her attack. She focused her attention on the hole behind him, the one made by Uchiha Sasuke during his match. '_He hid underground when the sonic blast went off, it shielded him from the concussion, and he used the Uchiha's tunnel to move away from the area…ohh crap…'_

She found herself face to face with Shikamaru, who was now holding onto the large fan, having brought it down from the sky while they were walking. She had been so distracted by her thoughts, that she never even noticed herself mimicking the movements.

With one fluid motion the Leaf nin held the heavy object directly over her head, and looked at her expectantly, while she held up only air. "Well…are you going to quit or are you going to make me drop this on you?"

To her further horror, his arm began to tremble slightly. "I'm waiting, it's very heavy and holding it up is far too troublesome…"

Finally to both of their reliefs, Genma stepped in to declare Shikamaru the winner. The lazy Nara, Released the girl who barely got out of the way before the fan left a crater in the ground before her. Upon seeing this, her eyes nearly popped out of her head.

"W…where the hell did you get that thing anyway?"

In response Shikamaru merely walked away and pointed to the hole he had ambushed her from. An image of Uchiha Sasuke dropping it there flashed through her mind.

The Sound Kunoichi watched him as he made his way back up to the stands, a small blush spreading its way across her cheeks.

She was about to follow him when a strong hand clamped down on her shoulder. "You will come with us."

Slowly Kin turned to see two ninja standing behind her, both with white animal masks covering their faces. "What…"

The second of the two indicated the stands around them. "Your attack injured a great many civilians, not to mention the visiting dignitaries. We're placing you under arrest until your Kage can be contacted."

The color drained from her face. _'no…when he's done with this village, he'll come after me…'_

The three of them vanished into a swirl of leaves.

­­­­­­

"Hai, Hokage-sama, the more serious of the injured civilians have been brought to the hospital, otherwise we are ready to continue with the exam."

The third fire shadow nodded to his subordinate and signaled to Genma in the ring.

"The last match of the first round…Hyuga Hinata vs. Sabaku no Garra…"

Hinata gulped nervously. She had been dreading her match since the prelims, and now that it was time, she couldn't decide what she was more scared of…her opponent… disappointing her clan…or looking like a fool in front of Naruto.

Her opponent was already making his way down to the ring. He hadn't even spared her a glance. Her eyes, seemingly of their own accord sought out her crush, only to wish they hadn't.

Naruto was staring right at her, his trademark grin spreading across his face. "Don't worry about it Hinata…you'll do great, I know it."

The girl nodded to herself and, wishing that she had the same confidence, followed the last of the three Sand Siblings down the stairs.

No sooner had she taken her first step down when she heard a deep voice within her head.

'_Hinata.'_

_Flashback_

"_Hinata. Come in here."_

_She had only just arrived back at her clan's home following the end of the preliminary round, and had been told to report directly to her father._

_As protocol required, she knelt outside of the sliding paper door, which covered the entrance to Hiashi's private study._

_After a moment of silence he had called her inside._

"_Your performance during the preliminary matches…was unlike you."_

_He had been there of course, standing behind the Hokage, he had seen what she did to her opponent. _

"_I…I…" He voice failed her. "Tell me. Was it your intention to remove the arm of your opponent?"_

_The comment reminded her of what she had done, quite accidentally, and brought tears to her eyes. Her father just nodded. "Yes, I thought as much."_

_As he leaned forward over his low desk, she seemed to shrink more. "Up until that moment, you were doing quite well."_

_It was if he had just dumped cold water on her. In a flash of shock her head snapped up and she stared at her father openmouthed. _'Did he…was that…a…compliment?'

"_The Clan Elders believed that you had finally come around. That you finally had displayed even a few of the qualities that would have made you a great clan head."_

_She didn't know what to think. _

"_I will NOT tell them that you defeated your opponent…by accident."_

_His voice was level, but the words carried with them a warning that was unmistakable._

"_This will not happen again. For the next month, I will personally oversee your…training."_

_Flashback End_

The memories of those first few training sessions, nearly made her quit the exam, but soon she found herself facing her opponent, with no clear memory of actually walking into the arena. She couldn't even remember activating her bloodline, yet she had. The fact that she could do it without seals, hadn't impressed her father any when she showed him. Just as it clearly hadn't impressed Garra.

Through the eyes of her bloodline, she could clearly see a large mass of Chakra contained within the gourd on his back. She had watched his match in the preliminaries, and it came as no surprise when she saw the chakra surge upward, shooting the cork at her.

It was an opening move he'd used against many opponents. It tested the speed and reflexes of those he fought, and thus he knew which of his victims would be able to provide the best validation of his existence, so when the girl before him, whom he had virtually disregarded, avoided the projectile with barely a move of her head, his interest was piqued. He had been briefed on the girls clan of course; The Hyuga…renowned for their perfect chakra control and highly developed form of Taijutsu. Details were pretty scarce, however all Suna Ninja had been ordered to treat all members of this clan, even the children, as if they were Jonin level. This girl though, had shown that she was an inferior example of her Clan during the preliminary round. The damage she had done to her opponent had impressed him slightly, mostly due to the amount of blood that had been spilled as a result, however her own reaction had caused him to write her off as a weakling and it highly disappointed him that he would have to fight her now.

"Combatants ready…"

Hinata took up the typical relaxed stance of her family's style while Garra hadn't moved at all.

"…BEGIN!"

Three long ropes of sand extended out from Garra's gourd, and flew at Hinata at a speed which slightly surprised her. She was however easily able to duck under the attacks when they sped over her, and then to roll to the side when they changed directions. This impromptu dance continued for only another moment, when the two strands separated into four and came at her from both her left and right.

Hinata, tracking all of them through her bloodline, took a few steps to her right, towards the strands of sand, and, performing a quick pirouette, touched both along their lengths as they flew by, and did the same to the others when they passed her on the other side.

The result was instantaneous. All four strands of sand, from their tips to the point where her hands had made contact, lost all cohesion, and dissolved.

The crowd leapt to their feet in a roar of applause for the Hyuga heiress, while Garra simply cocked his head to the side. He tried to lift the fallen sand again, but the chakra stored within it had been completely displaced. His eyes glinted as he locked gazes with her. "You…will give my existence meaning…"

Hinata, a little unnerved by the look he was giving her, quickly replaced herself with a fallen branch, left over from another round, as the remainder of the sand around her surged inward in a large mass.

As she came to rest from the replacement, she began to run at Garra, jumping, dodging and disrupting any masses of sand that came near her. Several times she'd had to retreat as a wall of sand rose up before her, only to continue when she had gotten around the obstacles.

The more sand-based attacks the girl had managed to avoid, the more Garra's bloodlust grew, already he could feel 'IT' begin to stir in the farthest reaches of his mind.

The girl swiped her hand through a patch of sand that had managed to catch her foot, and continued towards him. He had prepared for this though. When she was within striking distance of him, an entire circle of sand rose up around him in a pillar, with another slightly larger circle doing the same around both of them. He grinned madly as he reached out towards where she had to be. "Mother…wants…your blood…"

Hinata was growing more nervous by the second. She now found herself trapped in a slowly contracting column of sand that had closed over the top. Trying to go underground, even if she did know any Doton Jutsu's, would be suicide against this opponent. Her theories on Juken's effectiveness against the sand had proven correct, and she might be able to get out by disrupting the chakra flow in the wall before her, but probably not before the rest of it crushed her. She was left with no choice. Slowly she closed her eyes and inhaled deeply to calm herself.

Flashback

_Hinata fell to the ground in exhaustion. It was only the beginning of the second week of her training, and after Neji had revealed that he could perform the ultimate defense of the Main Branch, Kaiten, Hyashi had insisted that she also master the technique. The problem became almost instantly apparent though. While virtually all Hyuga have perfect, or near to it, chakra control, this particular technique required one to expel chakra from all of their tenketsu at once, while spinning. _

_Hinata, no exception to this, could push chakra out of practically every part of her body, a fact that had caught Neji off guard when she launched a Juken strike with her elbow. Her father's reaction was to berate her about deviating from the traditional Juken form. The problem was that she couldn't manage all of her Tenketsu at once. She lacked sufficient chakra._

"_Get up and do it again."_

_She was nearing complete chakra exhaustion, and collapsed to her knees again when she tried to comply with his wishes. As her Byakugan faded she thought she saw signs of regret, even worry on her father's face, they were gone though by the time she looked up at him, having been replaced, if they were even there at all, by disappointment. _

_The Hyuga Clan Head, closed his eyes and began to walk away, as the sliding door before him opened and Neji limped in to the training room. _

_Hyashi considered his nephew with a critical eye. "You were supposed to assist with my daughters training."_

_His voice was flat, stern, but there was no anger there. The Hyuga were above anger._

_Neji bowed deeply, though it must have hurt him, not physically, to do so. His contempt for the Main house was no secret._

"_I am sorry Hyashi-sama. I was training with my team and was brought to the hospital following that."_

_Hinata also looked at him when she heard his voice. _

"_How, exactly, were you injured?"_

_In truth Hyashi knew how skilled the boy was. _

"_My Sensei arranged a sparring match for us. Our opponent…"_

"'_Opponent'? You mean that your whole team sparred against one individual? And you had to be taken to the Hospital?"_

_Neji bristled at the accusation. "The matches were one on one, consecutive." Lying would be useless, Hyashi was notorious for reading lies through body movement._

"_I fought him last and had to be treated for a paralyzing nerve toxin."_

"_I see."_

_Hinata looked up at her cousin remembering just who it was that had put him in the hospital. _'Naruto-kun…'

_Hyashi looked back at her over his shoulder._

"_Tell me, was he not also the one who eliminated your team during the second round of the exam?"_

"_Hai, Hyashi-sama."_

_Hinata couldn't believe her ears. Naruto had beaten Neji not once, but twice. Her cousin was a prodigy among even the Main House, and here she couldn't even manage to perform this one Jutsu._

_Hyashi again regarded his daughter. There was something stirring within her. He could see it. A small twinge in her spine, tightening of her fists, her pulse was quickening, there where many signs that this Uzumaki was having a profound effect on her._

"_Hinata…Your training with me is over. I will not oversee it any longer, not until you prove yourself to me will I take an interest in your skills."_

_With that he walked out leaving the two of them alone. Neji stayed only another minute before he too left._

_Alone, Hinata's mind raced over what she had just learned. She was happy to know that her crush was continuing to grow stronger. However she also felt even more unworthy to ever have his attentions. She remembered watching him train with his puppets, his fight during the prelims against her own teammate had been like watching a well rehearsed play._

_Then his concern for her wellbeing before and after her match came to mind. And with it the confidence he had inspired within her. _

_She could not perform the Kaiten. Maybe someday but not now. She would need a similar defense however. This was why her father had insisted on her learning it._

_Thoughts began to click inside her head, pieces fell into place, and an idea took shape. Slowly rising to her feet, she set off to work it out while she recovered her depleted chakra._

_Flashback End_

The sand was closing in on her, yet she seemed to take no notice. Instead she tried to focus herself. In the back of her mind, with so much riding on this match, she could vaguely hear the voice of her father, his disapproval of her beginning to erode her already shaky confidence in herself.

Then she willed the voice to change.

It became slightly higher in pitch, then more friendly and familiar. The words changed as well. No longer could she hear disapproving, or hurtful words being spoken at her. But it seemed the words were encouraging her, holding her together as they've always done, only louder now without her fathers overshadowing them.

Her eyes snapped open, Byakugan blazing, staring strait into the eyes of Garra through his two walls of sand. Instantly her arms were thrown out to her sides, and she focused a large amount of her chakra to her hands, willing it through the tenketsu located at the very tips of her fingers. The chakra took shape as her fingers began to glow a faint blue.

She brought her arms around in a slow arc which steadily picked up speed until they appeared to be nothing but a blur. The Chakra she had pushed out of her hands, rather than be thrust outward in a shield, took shape as long lines of blue energy.

"Shugohakke Rokujuyon Sho!" (Protection of the Eight Trigrams Sixty Four Palms)

The lines sliced neatly into the column of sand that surrounded her, and to the crowd it seemed that the sand was just exploding outward in small intervals as the girls chakra disrupted the chakra that was contained within the sand.

………………………………….

In one particular section of the arena, a large group of individuals, all with white piercing eyes, gasped in shock, and several older men began to hound a stoic looking Hyuga Hyashi.

Contrary to outward appearances though, the Hyuga Clan Head was in complete and utter shock.

"Father…what technique is that? I've never heard of something like that." His younger daughter's question was a good one and mirrored the thoughts going through his own mind.

"It seems…" the onrushing of voices clamoring for an explanation, of why the heiress to their clan was using a technique not of the clan, silenced immediately. "…that Hinata has created a new technique."

The silence continued. Most of the Elders had all but written the girl off as a failure, and the thought that she could actually create such an effective technique actually shook them to the core.

'…_Hinata-chan…'_ Despite the 'all seeing' eyes that surrounded him, not a single person noticed the small smile that had appeared on the face of the girl's father.

……………………………………

Garra couldn't believe his eyes. This girl had just devastated his sand with one technique. He could no longer feel the sand that her chakra touched, and consequently could not manipulate it. She had forced all of his chakra out of the surrounding sand, and forced him into a precarious position. He would still kill her of course. That was a given. But now, he would likely have to work to do it.

He was starting to enjoy this match very much.

He began to focus his chakra downward through his feet and into the ground, reestablishing his hold on the sand that now covered the floor around them. The girl's arms had begun to slow, indicating that her technique was coming to an end. Then he would have her.

……………………………..

She could feel her control over the chakra in her arms beginning to fail. She slowed her movement, slicing the last few tendrils of sand out of the air, and settled into the traditional Juken form. Even while she was working with her team on it, she never dreamed that the end result of this technique would be so efficient.

Unlike with the Kaiten, her defense didn't expel chakra, but rather focused it, so she didn't lose any of it until she let the technique go at the end. It had cost her very little of her reserves to perform, though the mental focus required left her feeling slightly lightheaded, but she couldn't lose sight of what she was doing.

Though he probably didn't know, she could clearly see the chakra extend outward through the ground from him, saturating the already used sand around them.

A small surge in the chakra still contained within his gourd was all the warning she had, and his hand shot outward, followed by a small wave of sand. He was trying to distract her until he could regain all of his discarded sand. So rather than back off, Hinata charged at the wave, cutting through it with both hands, and getting caught in the shoulder when the wave changed directions leaving her with a small gash on her shoulder blade. Surprisingly she didn't stop at the injury. Instead she lunged outward, and managed to impact Garra's out stretched arm just below the elbow.

Quickly he drew it back, while trying to put distance between them. The small amount of sand that had rushed up in his defense had been completely obliterated by the attack. His arm felt numb, and as he watched, the Armor of Sand that had covered it began to slide off the limb, revealing highly pale, dry skin beneath, which looked as though it hadn't seen the light of day for many years.

Hinata had no time to contemplate this however as she had to move to avoid being crushed by another wave of sand from the side. When she came to rest and saw that the sand wasn't pursuing her, she took a look at her opponent, so see him still looking at the hand she had managed to catch. There was blood on it, hers, from where she had grabbed him with her injured arm.

Garra looked at the small red drops in awe. Then did something that unnerved the girl, to understate matters.

He licked them off his skin.

The simple yet disgusting act brought a look of horror to her face and a look of rapture to his.

"Your blood…is so pure…so delicious…" he looked right at her with a crazed look. "…Mother wants more…"

His attacks began again, much faster this time, and Hinata found herself hard pressed to keep up. Her shoulder began to throb in time with her heartbeat. Her high degree of flexibility, one of the only things she had over both her sister and cousin in terms of skill, served her well now as she was forced to dodge more than she was able to attack with her Juken.

…………………………….

It was blindingly obvious to all those watching from the competitors' area, that Garra's only skill lay with his sand. It seemed unfair to Naruto that Hinata kept getting paired up against opponents who excelled against close range combatants such as her.

His grip on the railing before him, had only tightened throughout the entire match, the only exception being when she had pulled that amazing jutsu out of nowhere to escape that pillar of sand.

Behind Naruto, his teammate only scoffed at the Hyuga Heiress's predicament.

"What is it now Teme, do you have something to say?"

Since confronting him after his match, Naruto had avoided talking to Sasuke, partly because he wanted to watch the fights, but mostly because he knew if he had to listen to the boys attitude for much longer, he might well hit him.

Sasuke had always been a bit arrogant, but now…Naruto didn't know what was up with him, but he suspected that the source of it came from the mark on his neck.

"Not really, I just wish they would hurry up so I can get to my next match…against you."

The blondes grip tightened on the railing so much that the metal actually groaned in protest, and Naruto spun around to face his teammate.

"What the hell is with you lately, Sasuke?!"

The two were so close now that each could only see into each other's eyes, and to Naruto's amazement, and regret, all he saw was insanity. What Sasuke saw however was a person who was worried not only about Hinata, but himself as well. The realization set him back a small degree. So rather than snap back at the boy, to further unsettle him for their fight, he relented and backed off.

"…Nothing."

Sasuke turned around and proceeded to ignore his friend in favor of the match going on below them. After a brief smile, Naruto did the same.

………………………………….

Hinata was running out of options. Her opponent, who seemed to become further unhinged as the fight dragged on, had learned his lesson, and was careful to keep his distance from her. Using his sand more to herd her into one side of the arena, and thereby limit her mobility.

As she got nearer to the wall and farther away from him, Hinata knew that she would lose the match, and with it her life, unless she did something risky. So when she was close enough to the wall, she preformed a back flip from her position just as a large mass of sand impacted the ground where she had stood, onto said wall. The very second she felt the solid surface beneath her feet she launched herself out over the sand, in a spiraling leap which brought her back within effective range for her Juken. As she landed, she had to smack aside two masses of sand, and when she landed in a crouch she thrust out her uninjured arm, surrounded by a mass of blue energy. The palm thrust connected solidly with Garra's midsection, causing him to double over onto his knees while holding his stomach with both arms. He bent forward as a terrible wail tore from his open mouth.

The scream of pain reminded her starkly of the one that had issued from her opponent during the prelims. Only this time, she had done it on purpose, and so held her ground, while waiting to see of the judge would choose to end the match.

Genma was trying to decide just that in fact.

Before him Garra had just taken a full powered Juken strike to his stomach. He knew exactly what the Hyuga's signature Taijutsu did to the human body, and was frankly amazed the boy had survived having his organs pummeled like that. He wasn't entirely sure that the scream he was emitting was a result of the pain though. To him, for a moment, is almost sounded like a sort of insane laughter.

Either way, he couldn't let this go on. He threw his hands up into the air and announced Hinata as the winner, only for the scream/laughter to rise to new heights.

Garra slowly inclined his head to take in the girl before him. "M…Motheerrrr…wants…to…to meeeeet… you…"

As she watched sand began to gather to him and slowly slide up his body. When it finally reached his head, his grin hadn't faded at all. The mass of sand continued to gather in size, and Hinata retreated back to stand beside Genma, who had readied himself to intercede, when it became obvious that Garra had no intention of submitting to his judgment.

The large pile of sand began to undulate, and shift, as if it were a balloon filled with water. It expanded in some areas, contracted in others, and generally began to take the shape of some kind of overly large animal.

The hairs on Naruto's neck stood on end, and a warm feeling began to shift and churn in his stomach.

Two large 'arms' reached outward to support the large form, still on Garra's skinny legs, a tuft of red hair still visible on it's head, while a long tail-like appendage whipped behind it eagerly.

Genma took a step forward, placing himself between Hinata and the beast Garra had become. "I have already made my ruling on this match. If you pursue this, then you will leave me with no choice."

The laugh that issued from the monster of sand echoed maniacally throughout the arena. Garra took a step forward, and Genma shot the senbon out of his mouth at a high speed. The wooden needle impacted the sand creature in the forehead, and buried itself so deep that it must have hit him.

Hinata was just as surprised as Garra seemed to be at that moment. Especially when, through her bloodline, she saw the chakra-filled sand surrounding the needle, begin to sift and fall away, taking the needle with it, leaving a small patch of pale, dry skin behind it.

"W…what…"

"That Senbon is inscribed with a tiny chakra suppression seal. It should have pierced his head as well, but the sand was denser than I had anticipated."

Even as they watched Garra's sand began to recover the bare spot. "**Very well…you die first."**

A large arm whipped outward, and caught Genma on his leg as both Leaf nin tried to leap away. The blow sent him tumbling to the side of the arena. And Hinata watched while several Leaf Jonin and ANBU stepped onto the top of the wall of the arena, intent on interceding.

…………………………..

Sarutobi leaned forward in his chair, and with a slight gesture to the two Chunin guards at his side, sent them forward to help stop the rampage that was to come. The two guards barely made it to the ledge of the Kage's box, when the two Suna guards, flashed outward, burying a kunai into the backs of the Leaf nin.

Sarutobi watched all this with out even a twitch.

"Now, now you wouldn't want to spoil my son's fun would you…Sarutobi-sama."

The only reaction that came from the old man was to sigh heavily. "Should I even bother to ask what you did with the Kazekage?"

A hissing laughter issued from the 'Kazekage'. "So you did know. For how long may I ask?"

The two dead Chunin disappeared in a puff of smoke, as the Kazekage tilted his head in amusement. Sarutobi rose to his feet and met the gaze of the man next to him.

"I've met the Kazekage, face to face, on several occasions, and, believe it or not, he has even met Naruto, and was quite looking forward to see him take part in the exam. Yet you act like you've never even laid eyes on him before. You see the Kazekage and I have become good friends over the years, even if 'official' relations between our nations are currently strained. Besides…you never could completely mask that snake smell Orochimaru."

The man grinned evilly beneath his mask.

"How long have you been impersonating him?"

"Kukukuku. Ever since the fool refused my proposal." The Hokage nodded mournfully.

"…what now?" The Sandiame Hokage looked completely resigned to what was about to happen.

"Now…you die…sensei." Orochimaru slowly pulled his disguise off, revealing a face that looked far younger than it should have been. Following his lead, the two Suna guards that had attacked the Thirds shadow clones, removed theirs, revealing them to be four not two, and each had a satisfied grin on their faces.

"Shall we…" Orochimaru indicated the roof of the building. Sarutobi took the lead, followed by his former student, and three of the four Sound ninja. The fourth, a boy with six arms, looked down into the arena to see several Jonin step up to fight the Sand's demon carrier, and laughed.

"You're gonna be way too busy for that." With that he tossed a large smoke bomb over his shoulder and followed the others onto the roof.

AN: And thus the exam ends. Thanks to all of you who've reviewed. I'm currently working on the next chapter and is should be out sooner than these two were.


	14. Chapter 14

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 14

By Riotv2

The situation within the arena was growing heated as several Jonin Ninja had entered it to help pacify the enraged Sand _Jinchuuriki_. From his place in the participant's booth, Naruto could see the Sensei of teams 7, 8, and 10, as well as Gai and several others, a mix of Chunin, and Jonin, as well as a small group who looked like Hyuuga.

He was about to go down himself when a loud bang rang out from above him, which drew the attention of just about everyone involved.

'_What the hell is going on?!'_

The blonde began to grow drowsy as feathers began to fall from the sky. All around the arena people were falling asleep where they sat, or stood.

'_G…gen…jut…su…'_

Hastily, Naruto connected chakra strings to his own body, and hit himself with a small pulse of chakra, one of the techniques he had learned from the scrolls that Chiyo had given him, and he became instantly alert to the fact that the arena was now surrounded by foreign ninja.

Naruto was not alone in this observation however.

Garra began to laugh insanely when all those who had chosen to face him, began to take stock of the situation. One of them, the one with the large sword, took a step forward.

"I'll take care of him. The rest of you go protect the civilians." As emphasis to this, Kakashi drew the large blade off of his back and held it before him in a curious stance that seemed almost nonchalant. His posture mirroring the tone in which he spoke, as if this was something he did every day. From behind him the protests of the few Hyuuga were drowned out by the cries of Konoha's Green Beast as he ranted on about the 'hipness' of his eternal rival, then, without waiting for anyone else to respond, Gai took off into the stands, much to the ruin of every Sound nin that crossed his path.

"No."

It was just a single simple word, yet everything around them seemed to stop for the one who said it. The Jounin all turned to see the one who had spoken, Hyuuga Hiashi, striding forward at a leisurely pace.

"Hatake Kakashi…The abilities of my clan have already proven to be effective against his techniques. I will finish what my daughter has started. All of you… go protect the village."

With a look to the others, Kakashi nodded then leapt up into the stands to join the one-man war being waged by Gai.

The other Leaf Jounin all followed, however the Hyuuga, branch members it seemed, hesitated until a stern look from their Clan Head sent them on their way.

By the time Hiashi's blank eyes met the gold of the Sand Gennin, his Byakugan was already active and he had settled into the opening form of the Juken.

Naruto, after 'waking up' Shikamaru, and seeing that he didn't need to do so to his teammate, took stock of the situation. All around the stadium, one on one, and even two or three on one fights were being fought, while below him, Garra was standing before someone who looked like an older version of Neji, Hinata was taking small steps backward, while staring at the mans white robed back. Above…something had happened with the Hokage, but he couldn't tell what at this point.

Naruto was torn. He had three ways to go; up, down or to the stands, and in each direction, his friends were in danger. Beside him, Sasuke was looking around him as well, the insanity from earlier forgotten, for now anyway. "Man, what a drag…" Naruto smiled faintly, only Shikamaru would describe a devastating assault on their home as being 'a drag'.

"We should find Kakashi-sensei…" The words had barely escaped the blonds lips when his teammate indicated an area of the stands.

"There." Sasuke leapt out of the box and ran along the walls towards a particularly thick fight taking place not far away. Naruto wasn't far behind him, however Shikamaru just watched them for a moment. "_sigh_ Troublesome…" the lazy Gennin opted instead to take the stairs.

To Naruto's surprise, there were very few Jutsu being utilized by either side, it was good because it meant that there would be few casualties among the civilians in the stands.

……………………………..…….

Several Sound Ninja surrounded Kakashi, as one they all leapt at him, only to be cut down as he spun around once with his massive blade. He had to admit, this kind of combat seemed natural with this weapon, albeit messy, the immediate area around him had become drenched in blood, though the sword itself had very little on it.

Two more of the Oto Nines came rushing at him arms held back ready to throw their Kunai at him, when they were intercepted by two blurs, and it took Kakashi only a moment to recognize them for what they were.

One of the nin fell to the ground, dead, after having one of Blades 'hands' pulled from his stomach, while his partner's neck had a white appendage wrapped around his throat. He too fell after a sickening snap.

Behind him Sasuke was in the process of cutting a third nin's throat from behind, while Naruto hopped down from where ever he had been controlling his puppets from.

"Kakashi-sensei…"

"Good, the two of you are still awake…Sakura should be around here somewhere, find her and see to protecting the sleeping civilians, let her tend to any injuries, but protect her too."

Sasuke nodded but Naruto hesitated. "The Hokage…"

Kakashi dispatched another nin, then spared a glance at the Kage's box. "He can handle himself." His words held more confidence than he felt at that moment, and soon found himself too busy to worry about anything else.

……………………………………………………..

Sakura as it turned out was already tending to a civilian who had caught a stray shuriken with his shoulder. It was a good thing the man was asleep or she might not be able to clam him enough to deal with it, still… it said a lot for the strength of the jutsu that the man hadn't even woken up from the pain of the injury.

She was so engrossed with her work that she didn't notice the Sound nin looming over her until his blood sprayed across her back. He fell next to her and she turned to see both of her teammates on watch for more enemies.

"Kakashi-sensei wants us to see to the safety of the civilians, and for you to do what you're already doing." Sasuke hadn't even spared her a glance, but Naruto smirked at her briefly before sending his two puppets to intercept a ninja who was going through hand seals, in preparation for some kind of jutsu. A white arm tangled up his hands while two long flat knives were sliced through his back.

"They're not using many Jutsu…"

Sasuke who had engaged another in hand to hand combat answered over his shoulder.

"They've immobilized the civilians to keep them in place…they probably want them for hostages."

Naruto nodded, it made sense. As their fight continued, Naruto spared a glance downward to see if Hinata was alright and nearly lost control of his puppets. "W…what…?"

Neither Hyashi nor Garra had moved for several moments, and Hinata wondered if this fight would be settled purely by a battle of wills. If that was the case then her Father had every advantage, however it was not to be as the sand covered form of Garra held his massive arm back and then 'threw' several sharp blades of sand at the stoic Hyuga Clan Head.

All of the 'sand shuriken' were destroyed in the same manner Hinata had disrupted the boys attacks during their match.

Garra's bestial eyes narrowed to slits, and he made the connection. These two were from the same clan. He inwardly smiled in glee and sent attack after attack to test him. He expected for the elder Hyuga to disrupt his chakra much like the girl had, however when the man vanished in a blur of motion, he was caught off guard. Even more so when the man reappeared next to him and drove an open palm towards Garra's midsection.

Barely he managed to hop back and bring his large arm between them, which, rather than dissolve like it would have under the girls attack, exploded, sending him back even further. Garra tried vainly to recover his balance, but found that it was just not possible since the right side of his body seemed almost triple the weight of his left. He looked down to see that most of the sand that had covered his arm and ribcage was now gone.

He looked at the man again and let out a piercing, blood curdling scream of rage. More sand began to gather to him, and even as he began to regain his form, Hyashi knew that there was more going on here. The boy's chakra had begun to go insane within him, and suddenly without warning, the area was covered in thick dust as all of the chakra being gathered within him exploded outward.

From their position on top of the roof of the stadium, both the Third and Orochimaru turned to see the large explosion of white smoke.

"_Kukukuku_ it seems as though Garra has finally started following the plan. Pretty soon, _Sensei,_ this village will be reduced to rubble."

Sarutobi just stared in horror at the giant form that was hiding within the white smoke.

"Shall we get started ourselves?" He nodded to his four subordinates and as one they all started a series of seals. Before long a large purple barrier was erected around them.

Hyashi was stunned. Before him, through the dust screen, stood the largest mountain of chakra he had ever before encountered. It nearly took up the entire stadium floor, and it wasn't until it began to move that he realized that it was more than just a large pile of sand.

Faster than he would have thought possible for something this massive, a large wall of compacted sand swatted him into the arena wall, hard enough to leave an impression behind it.

Hinata stared in shock at the sight of her injured father. Never before had she seen anyone manage to lay a hand on him in any match he had fought in.

She was brought back to the matter of Garra's new transformation when the ground shook tremendously from the impact of a giant foot. Her vision traced its form upward, and the remaining smoke cleared in time to meet the gaze of a giant raccoon. Its eyes flashed a brilliant gold and in that gaze she saw her own death.

With a triumphant howl its massive arm came flying downward at her. She tightly shut her eyes, praying to Kami for the impending pain to be over quickly.

Silence overcame her surroundings, like the calm before a storm, time seemed to stop as images began to fly through her mind; Naruto's image seeming to linger longer than the rest, then like a lightning bolt splitting a tree, the silence was broken.

"KAITEN!"

Her eyes flew open to see a large spinning dome before her. She had seen the technique many times before, but never on this scale, while usually the dome is only slightly taller than the person creating it, this one slowly expanded in height, looking more like a small tornado than a dome, pushing back against the sand appendage that threatened to end her life. And even as it was expanding higher, the sheer force of the attack was causing the dome to sink further into the ground in an ever deepening crater.

Hinata looked up at the monster before her to see that its arm was being devastated by the technique, already it had been ground off to about mid way from its elbow and with each passing second the damage became worse.

"HINATA! RUN!"

Her breath caught in her throat. That voice…she knew instantly who it was that was defending her.

"…F…fathe..er…"

"RUN NOW!"

She could see that the battle of wills she had predicted just moments ago had come to fruition, and it was going to end soon, either with the destruction of Garra's arm, or at the cost of her father's life.

She stood shakily and only now became aware of how numb her legs had become while sitting in the awkward position she had been in. With all the speed she could muster she edged her way around the wall, using it for support, towards the entrance to the streets.

Garra's large eye tracked her progress, a fact that did not go unnoticed by the girl's father.

"LEAVE MY DAUGHTER ALONE…**MONSTER!**"

With a final surge of chakra, the protective dome of the Kaiten exploded outward, taking with it most of the sand apparitions arm, well past the point of its elbow. The force of the act pushed the giant raccoon back a step as it tried to recover from the backlash.

Hinata turned to see the climactic end of their struggle. Her father's Kaiten slowed and dissipated to leave the bruised and bleeding man, standing knee deep in a hole, gasping for air.

After a mere moment, Hyashi wavered and fell forward.

"FATHER!"

Hinata made her way back to his side, falling into the crater left by his technique. She turned him over in her lap, and tried to find something, anything, she could do for him. Her Byakugan came to life, and she saw instantly that he had fully exhausted his reserves of chakra to save her life.

All of his reserves.

Most of those within the stadium paused in their various battles to gaze up at the massive form that had appeared before them. Foes were forgotten as side by side Leaf and Sound nin focused on the monster that had emerged from their worst nightmares. For the older generations of Leaf Ninja, the appearance of the Shukaku brought to mind vivid memories of the night on which the Kyuubi attacked their home. The chakra given off by this demon, while slightly different in nature, still inspired the same fear into them.

The members of Team 7 likewise stopped to see the spectacle before them. They had just witnessed the large demon swat a man in white robes into the wall of the stadium. Then, when it looked as though it was going to crush one of their own former schoolmates, one of the 'Rookie Nine' as they had come to be known, Naruto began to rush forward with his puppets, intent on trying to save her.

He was stopped when he saw that same man in white, Hinata's father, pull him self from the wall, trailing blood behind him, and leap in front of the monsters attack. He used the same technique Neji had used during their fight, and now Naruto saw that he had been lucky that Neji wasn't more proficient with it, because, in the hands of someone who, likely, had mastered the technique, it was truly awe inspiring.

Even as the man was shouting for his daughter to flee, none of those watching could muster the cognitive faculties to step in. The Kaiten was an amazingly beautiful technique, and when the dome of pure chakra began to push outward, it looked as though he would overcome this foe.

The dome surged outward forcing the demon backward into the side of the arena and the resulting crash broke the spell that had held them all in place was broken. Those watching finally realized that they were standing shoulder to shoulder with the enemy and the fighting resumed.

Naruto and Sasuke were kept busy for the next few minutes but Naruto was still able to catch glimpses of what was going on down in the ring.

Several individuals in white, grey and black robes had landed at the side of their fallen leader, even as the giant demon pulled itself free of the rubble that had been the arena's northern wall and stands.

……………………………………….

"Hinata-sama…"

The Branch member knelt down next to the girl and her father. He along with some of the others had left the fighting in the stands when the saw the head of their clan fall after his clash with the Sand's demon.

"Hinata-sama, please we must get the both of you out of here…"

"Yes Hinata-sama, Hyashi-sama must be taken to the hospital at once."

The ground shook again as Garra took a step towards them, causing them all to look up in time to see the large, only remaining, arm coming down on their location. Quickly grabbing the girl and her immobilized father, the group of Hyuga managed to leap away in time to escape the attack.

Hinata found herself on the side of the wall, being held there by the one who had grabbed her. The monster pulled his arm back out of the large crater it had made, and was preparing to launch another attack. The three Hyuga wearing the white robes of the Main House, nodded to one another, and leaped up towards the demon.

"NO, WAIT!" The branch member's shout went unanswered. The Main House members all aimed their trajectories at different locations on the demons body, and as soon as they all came into contact, they began spinning in large spheres of chakra.

"KAITEN…" Came their combined voices.

There attack seemed to do the trick for a moment. Sand sprayed away from the sections of the monsters body that they had hit, however with nothing to support them, gravity won out and they began to fall, carving three long trenches in the monsters body.

One by one their techniques faltered and the demon, seeing his chance, lashed out with sand from different places on its body and caught the three in mid air.

Their screams were brief and drowned out by the sounds of battle around them, as their bodies were crushed.

The three Hyuga Branch members, leapt as fast as they could up to the roof of the arena, hoping to get over the side and into the village before the monster caught up.

They didn't make it.

As they landed a large arm of sand crashed down onto and through the roof next to them, and into the stands below, killing all those unfortunate enough to have been sitting or fighting there.

…………………………………………………..

Naruto and Sasuke turned as one towards the opposite side of the ring from where they had been fighting. The large demon made of sand had crashed through the stands while in pursuit of the Hyuga.

Naruto gritted his teeth in frustration. That thing, was just going to keep slaughtering more people unless someone, somehow, stopped him. He looked to Sakura in the hopes of seeing the scroll he had given her before the exam, but it was nowhere to be seen.

"Sakura… where is that scroll I gave you to hold for me!?"

The pink-haired girl looked up at him in confusion for a moment before it dawned on her what he was asking.

"I had with me in my seat. It must still be there."

"Where?"

Sakura looked back towards where she had been sitting with Ino and a few others before all this started.

"Over there near that aisle, about five rows up…"

By the time she looked back at him he was already gone.

"…NARUTO! What are you doing!?"

The blonde had to use his two puppets to intercept another enemy ninja before he arrived at the indicated location.

He only knew of one other person who might be able to take that thing, but he had absolutely no idea where the old pervert had gone.

He had to move an unconscious villager off the floor before he found it.

Triumphantly he took the long scroll and moved back to where his two teammates were still working to tend to the wounded villagers.

"Naruto, what the hell did you…" Sasuke began to berate him for leaving them like he had.

"Not now Teme."

Naruto resealed his two puppets as he ran up the outside of a pillar and up onto the roof. He stood there for a moment looking across the arena towards the giant sand demon.

He took a deep breath and, after biting his thumb, tossed open the large scroll, flinging one end in an ark over the arena roof.

Instantly the area was covered in a massive amount of smoke.

…………………………………………………

The tears flowed down Hinata's cheek, weakly she managed to push herself up onto her hands and knees, and look around. When the monster had crashed through the stadium roof, the five Hyuga had fallen down into the ruined stands.

To her left she could see the two branch members tending to her father, and to her right….

Her eyes widened and she felt her breath leave her. The young Hyuga, that had grabbed her before, was lying on his back, his lifeless, pupil-less, eyes staring strait ahead at the large piece of wood that had impaled his chest.

Tentatively she reached out a trembling hand to close his eyes.

The act had been on sheer impulse. One she couldn't even begin to explain, but she knew with out a doubt, the image of the man's face would be forever ingrained into her memory of this day.

"Hinata-sama…are you alright?"

One of the other two Branch members approached her. All she could do in response was to nod her head once. He was about to help her up when a shadow loomed over them.

Looking through the debris at them was a large sand colored eye. After a moment, the eye moved downward, and the top of the monsters head came into view.

The sand there began to ungulate and grow into a mound, until it fell away revealing Garra from his waist up leering at them through the wreckage.

"…Mother still wants your blood…"

The Stadium began to shake again, as dust and other bits of wreckage began to rain down on them. The Hyuga wrapped his arms around the girl to shield her from any falling objects.

"That bastar…_what in the name of Kami_…"

Hinata looked up briefly to see the man's Byakugan active and his eyes showing an odd mix of fear and confusion. She cautiously activated her own bloodline only to see that the demon was not trying to bring the rest of the roof down on them, as she had thought.

In fact Garra no longer even seemed to register the fact that they were there.

Focusing her bloodlines sight beyond the Sands demon carrier, her eyes grew wide in shock at the view that now filled her vision.

"N…Naruto…"

………………………………………………

"_Kkukuku…_My, that boy is amusing…to think that **his** son would've built something like that. Ironic isn't it …Sensei."

Orochimaru cast a quick glance at the aging man beside him, expecting to see surprise written there, though he wasn't really that shocked to instead see a warm grandfatherly smile instead.

He had seen that smile many times directed at himself…at one time.

"Yes…Naruto is full of surprises." The third turned away from the spectacle Naruto was making on the roof not far away from where they were currently standing, and fixed his former student with a penetrating stare. "Shall we continue this farce or do you finally want to get serious?"

The Snake Sanin let out a hissing laughter. "Already?…You don't want to watch?"

"You could always surrender."

He shook his head in glee. This was proving to be more fun than he had anticipated. Garra may have been taking his time, but the prolonged attack on the Hyuga girl was causing quite a bit of collateral damage to the stadium…and to those civilians still in the stands. A fact that was causing the old man a great amount of pain, and Orochimaru was only too glad to prolong it. Still at least the old man still had his sense of humor.

"Very well."

Without warning the much younger ninja leapt back into their fight, trading blows back and forth, keeping his back to the stadium the entire time so the Hokage could still watch as his precious village was ripped apart one person at a time.

……………………………………………….

After issuing the orders to his team, Kakashi had begun to make his way around the oval building, leaving a trail of bodies as he went, most in two or three pieces. He had just brought his weapon down onto the shoulder of a Sound Nin who was about to stab his knife into the chest of a sleeping Chunin who hadn't dispelled the Genjutsu in time, when another explosion went off in the stadium in the vicinity of where he knew his team to be. His first thought was that more Oto/Suna forces had arrived. When he turned, however, he nearly wished that was the case.

On the roof of the building he could see the reddish form of a large fox settling into a posture that suggested it was about to leap at the Sand's Jinchuuriki. His first thought was that the seal that held the Nine-Tails had some how been released. However he couldn't feel the malicious, evil chakra that only belonged to the Kyuubi. The small amount of smoke that had surrounded it dissolved away and Kakashi was relieved to see only a single tail swishing around behind it.

That same relief turned into an exasperated groan when he saw who was standing on its head.

"Ohh Naruto…" He now knew the giant fox for what it was; the product of an overactive imagination belonging to a very hyperactive Puppeteer, who's most used, and favorite puppet was one designed to look like a small fox. It was a shape and form that Naruto had become so used to operating, that he did it on a subconscious level. As a result of that knowledge, Kakashi had to admit, a giant fox, if a giant puppet there had to be for whatever reason, would be the easiest for him to control.

'_I just know that you're up there somewhere laughing right now Sensei…'_

His thought process cut off immediately as more ninja tried to confront the Sharringan Swordsman.

Naruto swallowed hard against the large lump that had formed in his throat. This was going to be his first time using **this** puppet in battle. He mentally cursed himself for not thinking to include some traps or weapon into its massive frame, not that there had been time, nor did he have any idea he'd actually need it.

Below him the roof groaned loudly but seemed to hold the weight of his large wooden creation well enough. It was good because assuming that giant raccoon thing could use Gaara's skills, he'd need a lot of room to move.

He just stood for a moment staring across at his opponent, who was doing likewise. Neither combatant was moving, and the wait must have been getting to Garra, because the look on his face just seemed to grow angrier by the second.

Finally, having had enough of just waiting, Garra raised his intact sand arm and shot out three giant Sand Shuriken at the waiting fox.

'_Well here we go…'_

Naruto, throwing most of his weight into the movement of his chakra strings, forced the Giant fox into motion. It took a few quick side hops, while still remaining on the roof of the oval-shaped building. One of the three sand projectiles clipped the roof where he had just stood, and tore a good chunk of it off, while the other two continued over into the village, destroying several buildings.

Naruto mentally kicked himself, there might have been people in those buildings after all. The prospect of further destroying the village, while attempting to save it was a sobering thought.

'_It looks like ranged combat is out……ok then…'_

The Fox began to run along the stadium roof towards where the demon was currently standing. Garra just stood there watching it move with a sadistic smile on his face.

As Naruto neared the collapsed section of the roof, he jumped, aiming his trajectory to bring him over the head of the monster. Garra however, not having expected this, was a bit too slow in reacting, and was further caught off guard when the large whip-like tail of the fox slammed down onto the right shoulder of the Raccoon. Garra threw up his own arms to protect him from the shockwave of sand that erupted from the point of impact. A useless, automatic gesture since the sand, as if with a will of its own swerved to avoid hurting him.

The stadium rumbled and shook, the roof cracking, as the large fox landed on the other side. Naruto turned back to look at Garra's reaction to his attack. The boy was glaring daggers at him. Naruto smiled, usually pissing off one's opponent was a very sound tactic. It caused them to lose their ability to reason through certain situations, and threw them off balance.

However, it failed to occur to the blond puppeteer that Garra was already off balance. In fact he seemed right out of his mind since his match with Hinata began. So when Garra smiled and brought his hands together into a seal, the first anyone in this village had seen him use, Naruto became slightly worried.

"Hey Brat!" came a voice from behind him. He vaguely felt a slight vibration run through the large hollow puppet, as someone leapt onto its back behind him. "What the hell kind of mess did you get yourself into now?"

Naruto half turned to see a large man with long white hair striding toward him.

"It's about time you showed up Pervert-san!"

"Don't call me that!"

Naruto ignored the man until he jumped up onto the head of the fox with him.

"Can you summon one of those battle toads to help us with this guy?"

Jiraya had a look of contemplation on his face as he looked around them.

"This is not the kind of place to be having a battle on this scale."

"Ohh really…you think?!"

Jiraya promptly thumped him lightly on the head.

"Get serious…we need to lead him out of the village…"

"And how exactly do we do that?"

"What do we know about him?"

Naruto thought for a moment. "He doesn't seem too patient, and up until I showed up he's been chasing some Hyuuga around…"

Jiraya looked over the damage to the large body, both the missing arm and the three gouges in its torso seemed to be slowly regenerating…very slowly.

"The Hyuuga did all that?"

Naruto nodded.

"And now he's ignoring them in favor of you…he wants a challenge."

Naruto's eyes widened at the prospect. "So call out a toad and let's give him one."

Jiraya grinned. "So you admit your puppets not enough to…" "Not on your life Ero-baka."

With a tight smile Jiraya leaped off the fox and began to run through the hand seals for the summoning. Naruto for a moment felt a much larger concentration of chakra than he had for the other summon he'd seen, and after a large blast of white smoke, a large reddish toad appeared in the last remaining room of the stadium floor.

Naruto looked it over briefly. It had a scar over one eye and a pipe in its mouth. It also carried a tanto tucked into its sash.

Jiraya appeared on its head in some pose that Naruto supposed the man considered dramatic. Personally the blonde thought it made him look like an idiot.

The giant frog looked briefly around him, then seemed to grumble. "JIRAYA! I thought I told you never to summon me!"

Naruto nearly did a face plant. _'His own summon won't even listen to him…'_

The toads long wart covered tongue reached out and grabbed the old man off its head and held him upside-down before him.

"WELL...?"

"Listen Gamabunta, you know I wouldn't have summoned you unless it was an emergency…just look around you I think this qualifies…"

The toad boss looked around again taking in the carnage that was going on around them. He saw the large, unmistakable form of the Sand Demon Shukaku, and then saw the large purple barrier behind them.

"Ahh Orochimaru, hmmm…"

"Alright… I'll help…"

His tongue loosened its grip on the old pervert and he leapt once again onto his head, only to be roughly thrown off again.

"I said I'd help…not that you could come along for the ride…"

Jiraya landed on the roof of the stadium next to the large fox puppet, which Gamabunta had only just seemed to notice.

Naruto couldn't resist. "Hey, doesn't _anyone_ like you?"

Jiraya's head turned a new shade of red as steam came boiling out of his ears. "SHUT IT TWERP!"

Gamabunta, having watched the exchange could only chuckle, he liked that kid.

"Hey instead of just getting in the way…why don't you go see of you can help with your old teammate… your probably one of the few who could after all."

The toad hermit looked up to the barrier, and seemed to consider that. He nodded then leapt up to join the small group of ANBU who had gathered there.

Now Naruto and Gamabunta's eyes met for the first time.

"Hey kid, what's your name?"

"Uzumaki Naruto…uh…"

"Gamabunta; Toad Boss of the Myukabo Mountain." (Anyone know how to spell that? I can't find it.)

They nodded and turned their attention to their opponent who was also considering them in return. His hands were still held in the seal he had formed, and only after a few moments his head dropped and his arms fell to his side.

For a moment Naruto wondered if he was dead, until he could feel a large evil chakra emanating from the large sand demon. It built slowly at first, then grew to encompass the whole body. The sand colored eyes seemed to take on a new life and the regeneration of the damage done by the Hyuuga seemed to speed up considerably.

As if that wasn't enough of a warning that something was terribly wrong, the demon let our a piercing wail.

"**I'm FREEEEEE!!!"** The voice was highly pitched and caused all of the hair on Naruto's body to stand on end, like nails on a chalkboard.

The monster looked at both of its giant opponents, and laughed.

"**You guys…your all gonna DIEEEEEE!!!!"**

Without warning it sucked in a large amount of air and fired it at the two, Naruto moved to the side, and Gamabunta jumped strait up to avoid the attack, which was a feat since it was fired from almost point blank range.

The ball of air slammed through the stadium and kept crashing through the village until it crashed into the northern wall, tearing it apart in the process.

"Shukaku…Naruto! Out of the village now!" The Toad boss bellowed at him as he fired a small jet of water at the sand monster. Not really strong enough to do anything except get his attention.

Which it did…very well.

Shukaku let out a loud scream of rage and stomped after them, but halted after a moment. And looked back down at one specific section of destroyed seating. Naruto, who was still nearby, gasped when he realized what the demon meant to do.

Immediately he changed course and rammed into the side of the monster just as it was bringing its arm down into the rubble.

The impact nearly threw him off his puppet, but he managed to anchor himself with his strings. Naruto looked back at the rubble of the stadium to see Hinata and her wounded father being carried by two others making their way out onto the roof of the stadium.

The sand demon was recovering much faster this time, because it had already regained its balance and sent out two barrages of sand, one at Naruto and the other at the Hyuuga.

The blonde was off again before the sand could get a grip on any part of him, hopping after the others and overtaking them only slightly before the other attack caught them. He slapped aside the sand with the tail of his puppet, and then snatched the four of them out of mid air with that same tail while he made his way out of the village.

He paused only for a moment at the outer eastern wall, to make sure that the monster was fallowing him.

It was.

Shukaku had literally ripped his way out of the stadium and was moving towards them, surprisingly fast, while howling in rage.

"Uzumaki!"

The blonde looked down to the Hyuuga who were making their way towards him along the fox's back.

"We need to get Hiashi-sama to the hospital!"

Though he knew the man was right, he was torn. Shukaku had already gone after them once rather than follow him. If they split up now, nothing said that it wouldn't happen again.

"What about Hinata? Is she hurt?"

The girl in question was currently staring up at him, wide eyed and blushing, his question resonating in the back of her mind.

"Not badly, but we must get her to safety as well."

Naruto agreed with them, but, as much as he loathed to admit it, he needed her to stay with him…as bait.

"I need to lead that monster out of town, he won't follow me if he can just go after her again."

As if to punctuate this, the approaching demon fired another of those air bullets at them, only for it to be intercepted by an equally large water bullet. The resulting impact turned the area into a brief hurricane.

Gamabunta landed just outside the wall before them. "Let's go kid!"

Naruto nodded, but looked back at them again. "We need to go…I'm sor…"

"P…please take my father…and g…go…"

The two branch members looked at her in shock.

"Hinata-sama…"

"I w…will remain with N…Naruto-kun…and l…lead the demon away."

There was no time for an argument as the puppet lurched into a run over and beyond the wall, as the demon in question had almost caught up. As it neared the wall another water bullet from the toad boss blocked it's view of them and halted it for a moment.

"Whatever your dong do it fast."

The two looked back at him worriedly. "But…"

"I promise, I'll protect her and the village, with my life if need be!"

After a moment the two nodded and jumped down with Hyashi, and made their way back into the village, avoiding any areas of conflict they came across. Luckily the hospital wasn't far from where they had gotten off.

Quickly Naruto brought his hands together and summoned three shadow clones, each Henge'd into the likeness of the three Hyuga. Not a moment too soon it seemed as the wall before the demon was destroyed when it came barreling through. Rather than run away from it, though, like Hinata would have expected, Naruto headed strait at it, while it was focused on the frog before it.

The fox ran strait across it giving the demon a whip across the chest with its tail for good measure, followed by a glancing hit from another water blast and they continued to the tree line, followed closely by Gamabunta.

"Well what now brat?"

"How the hell should I know?! Up until now I was just trying to get it out of the village!"

"Mission accomplished, congratulations…now think of something else!"

"Um…anno…but…"

Both turned to stare at the girl, which only caused her to shrink into herself a bit. She was looking back at the monster that was still coming after them,

"… um it looks l…like all of the s…strange chakra is coming from G…Garra-san…"

Gamabunta nodded. "I see he's the demons carrier…and while he's asleep, the demon's taking him over, and by extension the sand that makes up that body."

"Huh?"

"If we wake that kid up, then the demon's link to that body, and this world, will be cut."

"Ohh ok, then let's wake him up."

Sarutobi smiled from within the purple barrier. _'Excellent work Naruto…'_ The two men had paused when the Toad Boss had been summoned, and shortly after that all three of them had left the arena and were making their way out of the village.

"So much for your plan. Orochimaru…"

The snake Sannin was currently gritting his teeth in annoyance. _'Only one person could've summon __**that**__ toad…if the fool is here then I'll need to end this sooner than I thought.'_

He grinned looked to his old teacher. "Ohh well good help is so hard to find these days…"

Orochimaru began another long series of seals, grinning all the time.

……………………………………….

Jiraya landed on the roof of the Kage's box, where several groups of ANBU had gathered in an attempt to help their leader.

The one wearing a yellow hood looked to him immediately.

"Jiraya-sama…We can't get through the barrier."

"What about under it?"

The ANBU shook his head. "No good the barrier extends under the roof as well."

"So we need to disrupt the source of the barrier then…"

He broke off as Orochimaru completed a series of seals and slammed his palm down onto the ground.

'_A summoning… but what is…ohh…ohh no…'_

A coffin propelled itself out of the ground, followed by a second, and after a moment despite the best efforts of Sarutobi, a third. All three had a single kanji on them; First, Second…and Fourth.

Jiraya went into action immediately. He ran towards one of the corners of the barrier shouting orders as he went.

"Call for reinforcements now, be ready to move in, whatever you do don't hesitate!"

He began his own seals and pushed both hands down onto the surface of the roof, along with a lot of chakra. "Earth Style: Swamp of the Underworld!"

Suddenly the roof began to loose its integrity and seemed to melt into a brownish-green muck. The effect of the technique stretched outward and the Sound ninja inside the barrier, one with a strange white lump on his back, began to sink into the swamp. He became stuck up to his waist, and was struggling to keep the technique up. After a moment he stopped sinking, and breathed a sigh of relief.

A bite on the finger, some chakra and a small puff of smoke later, and the Oto nin was surprised to see a tiny pair of eyes pop out of the muck in front of him. The eyes were followed by a small dirty toad. The toad had a small black vest on, and when it leapt up at him, it also drew a tiny katana.

"Ohh shi…" was the only thing the ninja had time to say before the small sword was driven into his heart by the small amphibious assassin. The toad vanished in a puff of smoke, its job done, and the ninja slumped forward, dropping his section of the barrier.

The very moment it was open enough a large group of cloaked ANBU, led by Jiraya, leapt through to join the Hokage in his fight. The last two through the opening let out a scream as they were consumed in flame, when the barrier suddenly closed again. Jiraya looked at the supposedly dead ninja, to see that he now had two heads, one of which was slumped forward, with blood leaking out of his mouth.

He had no further time for contemplation of this as Orochimaru began to laugh, and applaud them.

"Well done, my old friend…well done indeed. I almost didn't think you'd make it, but I am glad that I waited for you."

At that moment, the lids on the first two coffins fell to the floor. The third Hokage's gasp only confirmed Jiraya's worst fears. A gasp that was echoed by all of the ANBU present, when two figures stepped out from the wooden boxes.

"Hello Saru…you've gotten old."

The ANBU were torn between kneeling out of respect for the first two Hokage, trying to kill Orochimaru for the insult of disturbing their souls, and throwing themselves into the barrier out of fear of what was to come.

Jiraya was just staring at the third coffin. "Orochimaru…you didn't…you couldn't have…"

The Snake user merely scoffed. "…but I did…"

The lid of the last coffin fell away to reveal yet another figure. The man stepped out of the box and looked around. His startling blue eyes locked onto first his old Sensei then Orochimaru.

"Ohh great…you're losing your touch Ero-sensei."

Horror was now written on all of their faces. Jiraya was trembling and, Orochimaru suspected, several of the ANBU appeared to have soiled themselves.

The toad sage took a stumbling step forward. "…M…Minato…"

AN: Next chapter will bring an end to the invasion. As always thanks for the reviews, keep them up.


	15. Chapter 15

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 15

By Riotv2

Namikaze Minato, the Fourth Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, looked around the village as it was fighting for it's very survival. Next to him Orochimaru, the orchestrator of the attack was laughing maniacally at the scene before him.

"Jiraiya…where is he?" Minato was looking longingly at the village he had given his life to defend once already.

The white-haired sannin instantly knew who his student was looking for. "That brat is just like his father. He ran off to fight a giant demon."

In the distance The Fourth could see two large forms dancing around a third as they fought. For a moment one of them leapt up into the air, and the breath caught in his throat as he recognized it as a giant fox.

"Is…is that…?"

Jiraiya looked over at the fight himself and began waving him arms frantically at his student. "No no no no, that's just a puppet. It even only has the one tail."

Minato looked confused for a moment. "Puppet? He's a Puppet User?"

Sarutobi laughed. "He picked up the technique in Suna when he was a kid. Actually he's become quite strong."

That brought a smile to the resurrected man. "He is…Are you teaching him then Sensei?"

Jiraiya let out a groan at the question, and seemed to shrink into himself. Sarutobi laughed harder.

"No, Naruto won't let him teach him anything, beyond letting him help with a few seals."

"Your brat thinks that summoning toads is a waste of his time."

Now Minato joined in with the Third. "In fact…" Sarutobi continued. "…he built that giant puppet to show up one of Jiraiya's larger summons."

Watching the three interact so casually while an invasion was under way, The Second Hokage leaned over to his brother. "I think we've been snubbed." The First could only nod with a smile on his face.

"I think we've had enough of this little reunion." Orochimaru walked over towards the First and Second Hokage, taking out two kunai with red tags attached to them. "It's time for you three to do what I summoned you for."

Jiraiya rolled his eyes at his old teammate. "Oh, you're still here?"

The Toad Sage's remark went ignored by his old teammate, as Orochimaru raised the kunai up behind the first two Hokage.

"Sorry Saru, I guess we're enemies this time…do what you have to."

"Yea, don't go easy on us now Old Man."

The Snake user thrust both kunai into the backs of their heads, the wounds closing instantly around them.

Suddenly their eyes took on blank stares and their posture lost any trace of their former personalities.

Minato watched this with a measured expression. "You summoned our souls back to this world so you could suppress them…keeping our abilities intact. Smart, insulting, but smart."

"Oh don't worry Minato-kun…I have something even better in store for you."

In a flash of movement, he had buried a third kunai into the fourths chest, this one with a black tag on it, the Kunai lodged in his heart, and unlike the other two who didn't seem to bat an eyelash, Minato was doubled over in pain as the hole closed around the weapon.

After a moment he regained his composure, and stood strait up. The others on the roof watched this expecting to see him take on a zombie-like state, as the first two had done, however the beloved hero of their village remained as he was.

"I wont grant you the gift of not knowing what you are about to do, Minato-kun. You will be aware of every life you take…starting with those two. This village, which once hailed you as a hero, will curse your name far worse than they have cursed mine."

Jiraiya seethed. What his old teammate had just done was beyond even what he thought he was capable of.

Sarutobi just shook his head. "Are you really that bitter that I didn't name you Hokage…or is this because his son has become just as big a pain in your ass as he was?"

All the leaf nin on the roof began to laugh at that, even Minato. "Has he? Now I'm _really _proud of that boy."

Orochimaru gritted his teeth in anger. "KILL THEM ALL!!" The first two Kages ran strait at the large group of leaf nin, causing the ANBU to scatter and Sarutobi to rush strait back at them.

Jiraya tried to follow, but was stopped when a hand clamped onto his shoulder. He turned to see Minato looking at him with a tear running down his face.

The Fourth held back his fist. "I'm sorry Sensei…"

Jiraiya could only nod as the fist flew at his face.

* * *

Deep in the forest surrounding the village, a large group of San Ninja knelt in a large circle around a seal that had been drawn on the ground. Each held a scroll and was focusing their chakra into the seal, while an Oto Nin oversaw the ritual.

A rustling in the bushes behind them caused the Sound nin to turn swiftly throwing a kunai into the foliage.

It was caught by an ANBU in a black hooded cloak.

The ninja got into a fighting stance, but relaxed when the man took off his mask revealing the glasses and white hair beneath.

"A bit jumpy are we?"

"Kabuto-sama!" The man snapped into a salute.

Orochimaru's chief servant stepped into the clearing and threw aside his cloak, exposing his stump of an arm to them.

"Is everything ready here?"

"Hai, we're just about ready to complete the summoning."

"Good, proceed."

The man nodded and turned to the Sand Ninja, who hadn't even flinched when Kabuto had shown up.

As one they all lifted their scrolls and slammed them into the ground at each point in the outer seal.

After a large eruption of smoke, a huge three headed snake thrashed it's way towards the village walls.

The tired Sand ninja got to their feet, planning to join in the assault, until Kabuto called out to them.

"Hold on, I need you all for one more summoning."

One of them stepped forward. "We won't have enough chakra for that."

Kabuto smiled. "Don't worry you won't need any, and it won't take but a moment."

The Sound spy, bit his lower lip and smeared the blood onto his palm, then preformed a few one-handed seals, and slammed his hand down onto the ground. A second explosion of smoke filled the forest, and a deep hissing sound ran out around them, followed by a deep angry voice.

"Orochimaru! Where are you!"

The smoke began to clear and the ninja gathered there saw that they were surrounded by the massive coils of a massive purple horned snake.

Kabuto bowed reverently to him. "Manda-samma…"

The king of all snakes focused on the tiny man. "Oh it's you…were is Orochimaru? He knows better than to summon me without an offering…"

"Of course my Lord, as his representative… I offer you these lives as a sacrifice to your greatness…" As the Medic said this he indicated the Sand and Sound ninja currently wetting themselves behind him.

Manda considered them. "They will do…for a start."

Kabuto just watched as the clearing filled with the sounds of battle and the screams of a slaughter.

* * *

Naruto was becoming frustrated.

It seemed that Shukaku had caught onto their plan, because he had switched back to using long ranged attacks to keep either Naruto or the Toad Boss, Gamabunto from getting too close. And all of Gammabunta's own long range attacks were getting intercepted by the Ichibi's Air Bullets.

Both Naruto and Gamabunta came at him from different, nearly opposite sides, hoping to overwhelm him. However the sand demon simply responded by shoopint two blasts of air at them, one from his mouth and a second from another mouth that formed on his back.

Hinata and his clones, meanwhile, were hanging on for dear life, each disguised clone anchoring himself, as well as Hinata, to the puppet with their own chakra strings. Naruto risked a glance down at them, and caught sight of a large plume of smoke coming from beyond the outer wall to the north.

"What's going on over there?"

Hinata had her bloodline activated before he finished the sentence. She focused her sight on that direction, and let out a gasp.

"S…snakes…there are giant snakes attacking the village!"

"What?! Hey, Toad Boss…you hear that?"

Gammabunta was currently leaping at Gaara with his sword, this time managing to catch him in the shoulder. The blow left the arm dangling by a few threads of sand.

Once he landed on the other side he leapt up again, and spun to look in the direction of the smoke.

Naruto had absolutely no idea that a frog could growl.

"I know that devil!" he said as he landed. "It's one of Orochimaru's summons."

Naruto gritted his teeth. "Orochimaru…that bastard!"

"Jiraiya's busy, and I don't think anyone else in this village can fight something that size…" The toad was torn between the fight here, and the other opponents waiting for him.

Naruto nodded. "OK, go…I'll deal with Gaara until you get back!"

Gamabunta looked at the boy, an image of another man settling over him for a moment before fading again.

"Yea…I'll be back after I deal with him."

With another leap and another blast of water for good measure, the giant toad raced away to the north.

The attack was again intercepted by one of Shukaku's Air Bullets, the collision creating a monsoon in the surrounding area.

Naruto didn't hesitate.

Screaming his defiance at the monster, he rushed right through the storm at the raccoon, ducking, rather than leaping, under the damaged arm as it tried to swat at him. As he passed under the limb, he whipped his tail up into the shoulder .

The impact smashed through the, slowly, regenerating wound and finished what the Toad Boss had started.

The overly large arm fell to the ground with a loud crash, dissolving back into loose sand.

Shukaku, however, seemed to take no notice, as he whipped his own tail around and into the side of the fox puppet, sending it rolling across the ground.

The two disguised clones wrapped themselves around Hinata and took the brunt of the impact as they fell, dispelling them both and leaving her relatively unharmed. Naruto also wasn't seriously injured, as he had managed to anchor himself to the puppet. Though he was breathing heavily and he had a gash above one eye that bled into his vision.

The boy wiped away the blood, as he tried to get the puppet upright again, despite the damage it may have taken, and was mildly surprised to see that Hinata had climbed back onto the puppet with him.

Before he could object, or even think about it, the overgrown raccoon continued it's assault.

* * *

'Sauske' exploded into flame as a Sound nin managed to stab him in the back. The man was consumed by the fire and began to flail around in pain and terror until the real Sasuke sent him over the railing and down into the arena with a kick to his back.

"That should do it here…" Sakura said as she stood up from where she had been bandaging the arm of a civilian.

The two of them had continued to carry out their orders, despite the disappearance of their teammate. The fact that they had been left behind while he went off to fight the Sand's demon had pissed Sasuke off immensely. Fortunately there were plenty of Sound Ninja for him to take it out on. Though, the mark on his neck would not stop throbbing.

They both looked around for more enemies, but as far as they could tell, there were none left in their immediate area. Sasuke, let his Sharringan fade to conserve his chakra, and swayed a bit from the vertigo he experienced as a result of his now reduced vision. Sakura was also feeling the results of the long battle. She had been healing not just the civilians, but also any Leaf Nin she came across that needed it, an act that had actually saved the life of one Chunnin. Still, with her limited reserves, she was practically running on empty.

They were still looking around when a presence dropped down behind them.

As one they both turned, driving a kunai each into the person, only for them to bounce off of a solid object with a distinctive metallic clang.

From around the other side of the large object, their sensei poked his head out and gave them that familiar eye-smile. "Yo…" he greeted them as if they all had just gone through a team training exercise rather than fighting for the survival of their village. "…how are you two holding up?"

Sakura fell gracelessly to the floor, while Sasuke supported his weight on his knees, both looked as though they were having a heart attack.

"Well…it looks like the area's secured for now." He motioned them along after him as he made his way towards a group of other leaf nin who stood against the railing not far off. They were all looking in the direction of the path that Shukaku had taken through the village.

"Sensei…is Naruto going to be ok fighting that thing?" Sakura asked, worried for their friend.

It took a moment for him to answer, a fact that neither of them failed to notice. "Yes…I think he will."

The girl still didn't look convinced. "The Toad Summon he went with was personal summon of the Fourth Hokage. It must have been summoned by Jiraiya of the Sannin…who was the Fourths teacher. They should be able to handle it together."

'…_right…?'_

* * *

Jiraiya and his old student charged at one another, both hands held back with a small sphere of swirling light held in each. They both thrust outward at the same time and their attacks met in a thundering clash of light and sound.

When the initial shock-wave subsided the two men were still standing there pressing their four Rasengan together, the sound they were creating similar to thousands of nails on a chalk board, carried for over a mile.

Despite the overwhelming situation they found themselves in, despite the fact the Minato Namikaze, the Fourth Hokage, was trying to end the life of a man who had been a father to him, albeit against his will, both men were smiling.

Meanwhile, Sarutobi, who hadn't even spared them a glance and summoned Enma, the monkey king was now using the ape's staff from to ward off the attacks of the First Hokage, while the Second Hokage was chasing around what was left of the ANBU forces.

Sarutobi leapt backward, attempting to put some distance between them and thrust outward, the staff seeming to stretch. It shot towards the First Hokage, who ducked aside and was grabbed by the back of his armor when an arm grew out of the side of the pole.

Without stopping, and carrying the First along with it, the pole continued onward to hit the back of the Seconds knee.

The ANBU scattered when the blow caused him to lose his balance and stumble. The man turned around just in time to collide with his brother, who had come along for the ride.

The two armor clad Kage rolled and tumbled for a moment but quickly untangled themselves. Their faces a complete blank.

Orochimaru looked at the brothers with an exasperated sigh, then back at the Fourth and Jiraiya, still trying to out Rasengan one another. Their smiles made him sick. Holding out his arm, towards them, several snakes flew out and hit the Fourth in the back.

The force of the impact pushed him forward, causing their attacks to slip. The Fourth let out a painful scream as the Sannin's twin spheres impaled his shoulder and stomach. After only a second, which seemed like an eternity for the aging ninja, he was blown away in an erratic spin to smack into a giant tree which had sprouted as per the First Hokage.

"Minato!" Jiraiya rushed towards his student's side either not hearing or ignoring the pounding laughter of his old teammate.

The Fourth's body had been decimated by the attack. His entire arm, as well as most of his midsection had been destroyed. Pain was clearly written across Minato's face, but even as Jiraiya approached he could see that the damage was repairing itself at a rapid pace. He slowed to a stop as his student rose to his feet, clearly as surprised as he was.

"_Kukukuku…_you see Jiraiya? You cannot win this fight…any wounds you inflict upon them will only regenerate…the Leaf will fall." The snake carried off into another fit of laughter. Minato, with a tired pained look on his face, prepared to continue their fight, when Orochimaru called him to stop.

"Minato-kun, I have something for you...I hope you appreciate all the trouble I went through to find all of these."

The sannin opened his mouth and a snake slithered out of his mouth, depositing a rolled up bundle in his waiting hand then returned to the man's body.

"At first Iwa was _very_ reluctant to let these go...but after I explained that they would be used to bring the Leaf to it's knees...well they were only too happy to donate them."

Orochimaru tossed the object to the Fourth, who had started to tremble at what he suspected was within the bundle. He carefully began to unroll the fabric, and his eyes widened with fear, not for himself, but for all those he held dear to him, who, in all likely hood, were about to die.

"You...bastard..."

* * *

Hinata could see the strain on Naruto as he was trying to get his puppet moving again. Through her family's bloodline, she knew that he would soon run out of chakra, a thing that hadn't seemed possible, knowing what massive stores he seemed to have.

But now, he was already beginning to tremble with the effort of calling on as much as he could manage.

"Hinata-chan..."

His voice, grave and low, caught her by surprise.

"I don't know how much longer this can go on...I need you to get out of here...I'll try to keep him here as long as I can, but I need you to let everyone you can find know that...he'll probably attack again soon..."

The words echoed in the back of her mind. _'He'll hold him for as...Naruto-kun...'_

She was still thinking about it when they were violently thrown sideways as Naruto dodged another attack. The move punctuated by a loud crack coming from the shoulder joint of his puppet, where Shukaku's attack had landed the hardest.

She shook herself free of the possibility that Naruto would lose, and placed her hands in a seal focusing all of her chakra into her hands. She then, hesitantly reached out and placed them on his back, transferring all of the chakra that she could to him.

Naruto was trying to determine what Shukaku's next attack would be. When he didn't hear Hinata respond to him, he assumed that she had gone. However he instead felt a light pressure on his back, accompanied by a warm feeling spreading out through his body.

"Y...You can win N..Naruto-k...kun..."

Hinata was giving him her chakra...she still had faith that he would win...

The demon threw another swipe at them with his tail, which Naruto leaped over and rushed at the demon, screaming a challenge, intent on going after Gaara directly.

Shukaku stood watching the fox puppet approach, unmoving, unyielding...then he ducked.

Naruto's scream died in his throat, as he watched the demon smiling up at him from below, it's body more like fluid than sand at the moment. For a brief moment, he saw Gaara clearly on the top of the monster's head, and knew this was the best shot he had. He couldn't waste in. The whip like tail of Fox once again came down on the demon, aiming directly for the sleeping Jinchuriki, only to be caught by a large wave of sand that quickly solidified into the arm that had been destroyed by Hinata's father.

Shukaku's laughter echoed through the clearing as he yanked downward, slamming the fox into the ground and snapping the tail off in the process at it's root. The shoulder joint, damaged earlier by the demon, shattered and the limb flew off spinning as it went.

Dazed, Naruto looked around him for a Hinata. She had managed to cling to the puppet, but seemed to be nursing her arm, which was bent slightly at an odd angle in the middle of her forearm, as she lay shaking and crying across the twisted neck of the puppet. Naruto tried to crawl towards her, but was stopped as pain lanced up through his leg.

Looking down he saw a jagged piece of wood sticking out through his thigh.

Shukaku was dancing wildly around what was now a far larger clearing in the forest outside the besieged village, swinging the tail around like a trophy.

His antics died as he focused on them once more.

Naruto felt weak. The chakra that Hinata had given to him, used up. He had never been this close to complete chakra exhaustion in his life. His head swam with the blood loss from his leg, and Hinata didn't look as though she could get away now. He couldn't tell how great the damage to his puppet was, even if he had the chakra to move it again. Which he knew he didn't.

He had failed...his sensei...his friends...his village. He had failed them all.

"...I'm...sorry..." Darkness closed in and he was swallowed in sweet peaceful oblivion.

* * *

A giant purple head fell to the ground alongside the still twitching body of the three headed snake it had been attached to. Gamabunta wiped his sword clean on one of the flags worn by the serpent, and exhaled a puff of smoke as he was cheered by those few Leaf Ninja in the area.

The toad boss turned back in the direction of the battle he had just left. He still wasn't that sure about leaving the kid to take on Shukaku alone, but at the time there had been little choice.

Besides, the Gaki had a lot of his father in him. That much was clear from the beginning. Gamabunta didn't need Jiraiya to confirm it. He would've recognized the son of his friend anywhere.

As he put his sword away the sound of Shukaku laughing began to carry towards him from the distance. It could only mean trouble for the kid.

He crouched low and leapt into the air, going back to help, but was grabbed from below when a long thick object wrapped around itself around the lower half of his body, dragging him down just outside the ruined wall of the village.

As soon as he hit the ground, the object began to entangle him in it's monstrous embrace. Amidst his struggling, Gamabunta locked eyes with the last being he ever expected to see again.

"SsSsSsSs....Had I known that you would be here...I would not have required any sacrifices. I would have gladly killed you for free, Toad."

"It's good to.._ACK!_...see you too, Manda..."

The snake began to squeeze tighter drawing a strangled cry from his victim.

Gamabunta dropped his pipe, which bounced off the thick scales of the snake and rolled down to rest on the ground next to them.

Seeing the brush catch fire from it's large embers, the toad boss sucked in as much air as his crushed lungs were able with the snake crushing the life out of him.

For his part, Manda was rearing upward and unhinging his jaw, preparing to swallow the toad whole.

He never expected his prey to be able to fight back.

Gamabunta exhaled a small amount of oil at the open mouth of his rival. At the foul taste, Manda convulsed wildly, loosening his grip in the process.

Gamabunta began to thrash around trying to free himself, and after a moment he was able to hop free and spewed out more oil, coating the snake all over with it. He then picked up his pipe and stood holding it up in his left hand, while his right hung limply at a severe angle.

"Manda..."

The snake snapped it's focus on him.

"...burn in hell, snake." He tossed the pipe at his nemesis, and the oil caught fire instantly, engulfing him in a wildly writhing screaming blaze. Gamabunta just stood watching for a moment before picking up his sword from where it had fallen and slammed it down into the snakes head, causing it to vanish in a ploom of smoke.

He breathed heavily in relief. "Next time, Snake." Then out of energy himself, he too disappeared.

* * *

Minato's body seemed to be acting on it's own. He watched, resignedly as his own hands placed two exploding tags on the tightly wrapped bundle. He preformed a quick seal then threw the package up into the air as high as he could.

Dread overcame the Leaf Ninja who were beginning to understand, but all prayed that they were wrong...they weren't.

The bundle exploded, sending the contents flying out in all directions. Some of the Leaf Ninja tried to dodge/deflect the projectiles. While others hid behind whatever cover they could find. One unlucky ANBU caught three of the objects with his chest and neck, and fell over lifelessly.

One such object thudded down into the ground at Jiraiya's feet. He picked it up and, upon closer examination he found it to be an oddly shaped kunai, with a three-pronged blade and a complicated multi-layered seal on the grip.

There were hundreds of them scattered around the roof. The entire area inside the barrier had just become a killing field.

He tossed aside the knife, and began his own set of seals, before clapping his hands together, and pressing them into the ground, calling everyone to gather around him.

The ANBU were too slow. The First flash of light was quickly followed by a scream, and shocked cries of disbelief. Then another flash and a second scream, then another....and another.

Jiraiya cursed as his Jutsu took effect, like before the surface of the roof began to melt into a swampy water and swallowed the Fourths famed Kunai.

The floor re-solidified and left an area roughly half the size of the area where there were no more kunai and so where the Fourths Hirashin no longer worked.

The Third smiled at his student, a smile, Orochimaru noted, that was mirrored by the Fourth. He looked briefly at the first two Hokage's who had been standing off to the side, and the brothers threw themselves back into battle, while the Fourth joined them in combating the two powerful Ninja and three remaining ANBU.

Switching tact this time, the Fourth went after his predecessor, while the First battled with Jiraiya The second grabbed one ANBU by his face hard enough to shatter his mask and slammed him bodily into another, while the remaining one used his broken katanna to keep him at bay long enough for the others to recover and rejoin the fight.

As if on a whim Orochimaru picked up one of the stray Hiraishin kunai and with a casual air, tossed it near the unmasked ANBU. Sarutobi was momentarily blinded as a bright flash indicated the activation of the Fourth's signature Jutsu.

The ANBU didn't even scream as his throat was cut.

The fighters used the distraction to switch opponents, as Jiraiya once again took on his student and the Third pulled the First away from the ANBU, who he now noticed wore plain white masks, that might have been any of a dozen animals, and both, like the others, carried broken swords.

_'...ROOT?...'_

As the fighting continued, Orochimaru noticed that Jiraiya had the palms of his hands pressed together, while using his feet to ward off the Fourth. What exactly he was doing, he could not tell, but it mattered little after the Fourth stabbed him in the stomach with a normal kunai.

At least it didn't matter until the Toad Sage burst into smoke.

_'...Kage-Bunshin?'_

Jiraiya watched his clone get destroyed from up on a branch of the giant tree, while a second came, seemingly out of nowhere to take up the fight. His hands were still pressed together, and he let out a huge sigh.

It had been a long time since he had been forced to go this far to win a fight, but still, a perverse sense of pride filled him that it was his own student that made him do so.

Below, Orochimaru watched the real Jiraiya out of the corner of his eye, while the Fourth fought a clone.

_'What are you up to, pervert_?'

* * *

Kakashi turned towards the barrier in which, presumably, the Third was still fighting with the snake traitor.

He wasn't sure what had drawn his attention, but there was a very faint sound, like a buzzing vibration in the air, that was both familiar and nearly unknown, as if he only knew the feeling from a half remembered dream. None of the others seemed to even be aware of it.

"Sensei? What is it?" His two students were following his gaze, along with the other Jonin and Chunin.

His visible eye narrowed as he examined the roof of the building above them. There was something...a feeling there...he stretched out with all of his senses, trying to pin it down.

There were several powerful presences up there, he mentally began to count them off.

_'...That's the Third...and Jiraiya-samma....the traitor...those two are unknown, but...that one...I...'_

Suddenly a bright yellowish light illuminated the interior of the barrier, followed moments later by another.

Kakashi's eyes widened with shock. The pieces all seemed to fit with one impossible conclusion.

"Sensei!"

Without waiting for the others, nor even an explanation, he took off running up the side of the wall towards the roof, his two students trailing behind him and Kurenai, Asuma and Gai bringing up the rear.

Kakashi took a running leap, forcing so much chakra into his feet, that he blew a hole into the side of the building and came to rest next to a cloaked ANBU member standing at the edge of the barrier.

What he saw inside the barrier...shook him to the core.

A man, someone he had looked up to, who had been like a father to him after his own had died, the person who had taught him what it meant o be a ninja, the same man he saw every day in the face of is own student, who had given his life to defend their village, from a rampaging demon, stood not twelve feet from him, His white cloak fluttering heroically in the wind.

It was an image that was burned into his mind. The last time he had seen the man he had been standing in that same pose atop the head of the toad boss, Gammabunta, about to face the Fox.

"...Minato-sensei..."

And in a flash of light he was gone, streaking across the roof towards Orochimaru, and Kakashi was sure it would be the end of the traitor, until the Fourth stopped well short of the criminal and killed two Leaf ANBU with a single pass of his distinctive kunai.

He watched the last three remaining ANBU gather near Jiraiya, as he preformed his Swamp of the under world.

"Sensei...what...?" He was in shock. His friend, his _hero, _had just killed fellow Leaf Ninja.

All he could hear at that moment was the hissing laughter of Orochimaru, who it seemed had caught sight of all those now watching. By now the others had caught up and they too now stood with mouths agape at the sight of the greatest hero in the history of the village, killing their own people.

"Y...Yondiame...sama...w...why..."

Sasuke and Sakura turned as one towards Shikamaru's sensei, Asuma, with shock on their faces, for they were too young to understand the full horror of what they were seeing. The hadn't, until now, known who the man in the white cloak was.

As Sasuke watched, he saw the other two former Hokage as well, and with a tight smile, activated his Sharringan, and began studying the fight with renewed interest, hoping to pick up a new technique that would help him kill his brother.

Kakashi also rounded on his friend, causing the man to drop his cigarette at the sudden movement, as Kakashi grabbed him by his vest and yanked him forward.

"NO!...My sensei would never kill a member of this village...whatever has happened, whatever Orochimaru has done..._The Fourth Hokage is NOT A TRAITOR!"_

The enraged Jonin gave Asuma a shove backward that was, perhaps a bit more forceful than it was meant to be, and turned back to the fight in time to see a cloud of smoke envelope Jiraiya, who had been up in a tree.

One of the nearby ANBU began filling them in on what had happened before they arrived.

Before the smoke had time to fully disperse on it's own, a blur raced out of it and towards the First and Second. Both were sent flying backwards towards the large tree.

Where they had stood previously, was Jiraiya, leaning forward so that his white mane of hair fell completely over his face. He held his two fists thrust outward, from where he hit the two Kage.

"Well...this is a fine mess we're in."

"It's been so long since you called us here, and now we need to fight against them of all people?!"

"Young man! What the hell have you been up too?!"

Jiraiya straitened out and his hair fell away to reveal two small frogs seemingly growing out of his shoulders. His face had also taken on a drastic change as it was now more amphibian in nature.

"Sorry guys it couldn't be helped. Orochimaru brought them back and is now controlling them."

The Snake Sannin gritted his teeth in annoyance. "...Sage Mode..." He had only ever seen this technique used once before, when Jiraiya had used it to save his life the day they had been dubbed the 'Sannin'.

Now he was no longer absolutely sure of victory, but he was sure enough.

"Orochimaru..." Said Jiraiya. "I've grown tired of watching you turn my student into a murdering puppet... I may not have the full measure of your techniques anymore...but I trained him...hell, I raised him since he was a kid...and I know his weaknesses."

This brought several gasps of shock from those watching, mostly that the legendary man in question even had any weaknesses.

Without further comment, the two frogs on his shoulders began to sing. Their combined song froze the Yellow Flash in place, His face, oddly serene even as his body struggled to break free of the technique.

Orochimaru was livid. _'...dammit...a genjutsu...'_

He started moving towards them, hoping to break his slave-weapon free before his old teammate could get to him. He wasn't fast enough.

As soon as the genjutsu had taken effect, Jiraiya had rushed to his side, a Rasengan in his hand.

"I'm sorry...son..." The Fourth only smiled as the shinning ball of swirling energy was thrust into his exposed chest, directly over his heart.

Before the technique could send him flying into the barrier, Jiraiya grabbed onto his arm, holding him in place as he continued to dig the sphere into his friends body. The Fourth let out a scream that was inhuman, and after a moment more the Toad Sage released the technique while it was still inside his body, blowing a hole out of his back.

Bits of dirt and other unidentifiable things pelted the Snake as he had been standing behind the Fourth at the time. Multiple horrified sounds came from everyone on the roof, even Orochimaru who reached down to yank a Kunai out of his leg.

His eyes widened visibly and his hand began to shake as he saw a black tag hanging off of the end.

The Fourth fell limply to the floor and Jiraiya released his sage form, sagging in exhaustion. It had been years since he had been this tired.

Orochimaru cast the Kunai aside and signaled to the other two kage. The First, without verbally responding, began a short series of seals. All around him, a strange darkness seemed to spread, drowning all of the light within it and blinding all of those present.

_'...crap...'_ was Jiraiya's only response.

Then as quickly as it had spread, the Darkness receded back to its source before vanishing all together. Jiraiya looked to the First to see both him and the Second held from behind by two copies of the Third. Their bodies were shaking and soon dissolved into the corpses of two Sound ninja.

Jiraiya looked towards his sensei who was holding a complicated seal in front of him. The seal was all too familiar to him.

"You didn't..."

The shirts of the two clones had ripped away to leave a seal on their abdomens in the shape of a spiral.

"There was no other way Jiraiya..It has to be done."

The Third pointed the seal at Orochimaru as another clone leapt up behind him. The clone grabbed him in the same way the others had their targets, and after a moment his shirt ripped as well.

"Can you see it yet Orochimaru...can you see what awaits us?"

His eyes opened wide as the spectral form of the Shini-gami appeard before him.

Then he began to laugh.

His mouth opened wide and another Orochimaru slithered his way out of him. The first Orochimaru turned to mud.

Sarutobi's eyes grew wide."...No..."

All three clones vanished as one, and the aging Hokage gripped his body as he fell over in pain. The two remaining ANBU rushed to his side.

"HOKAGE-SAMA!"

"It...cannot be helped...Jiraiya..I leave him...to ...you..."

The white haired man nodded, though he knew he was in no shape to match his old teammate.

"Actually...I think I'll handle it if you don't mind, Ero-Sensei."

All eyes were drawn to where the Fourth was now rising to his feet. The hole in his body was nearly done regenerating and he flexed his hands and arms as if testing the extent of his newly healed injuries.

"It is my job as Hokage after all."

Jiraiya could only nod in awe at his student.

Seemingly satisfied with the answer, the Fourth grinned evilly at Orochimaru, who had back up to the far side of the roof. With his last step he accidentally kicked over a kunai that was sticking out of the ground. It clattered to the floor and he realized his mistake.

The Fourth vanished in a flash of yellow light.

All those present were unprepared for what happened next. As Orochimaru came flying towards Jiraiya only to be blasted aside in another burst of light, and again a moment later by another.

This went on for nearly three full minutes, and all those watching could only laugh in growing excitement as Orochimaru was manhandled all around the interior of the barrier in a strange game of pinball.

For the two younger members of team seven it was something right out of a history book, literally the only lecture that all of them had paid attention to was the one about this man.

Kakashi had tears growing at the sight, as did many of those who were around for the Rock-leaf war.

As the multiple flashes of light grew in intensity, all over the village, Ninja of both sides stopped fighting to watch the strange fireworks, and only a few realized their significance.

However, all those who were fighting to defend their village and loved ones, gained a renewed sense of courage and their hearts were lifted almost as one, and began fighting back with a determination that shattered what was left of the resolve of their attackers.

Jiraiya who had taken a seat on the broken tiles of the roof, smiled in glee as Orochimaru flew towards him and was then slammed down into the roof, causing a large crater, under the heal of the Yellow Flash who was now standing over him, with wisps of yellow energy clinging to his body. His foot was still planted into the pale mans gut.

Cheers rang up all over the roof as Minato glared down at the twitching form of their enemy.

"All of your plans have failed...you are defeated and the Leaf still stands. When will you learn that you cannot extinguish the will of fire that burns within this place?"

Orochimaru, with much difficulty tilted his head and looked around him at the crowd that had gathered, however none noticed him meeting the eyes of his four subordinates.

Jiraiya joined his student and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"Go on Minato...finish it...for his sake as well as that of the village."

The Fourth looked down on him again as if considering that very action. The shook his head.

"No...he will stand trial first."

With that he wiped a small amount of the man's blood onto his hand and began a long complicated series of seals, that even Jiraiya lost track of.

Everyone present was so mesmerized by their savior that they missed the small hand sign that Orochimaru was trying to make.

Minato finished his seals and his right hand began to glow with an intense bluish light. Finally Jiraiya realized what his student was intending. "Are you sure about that...after all he's done..."

"I;m sure."

Minato raised his hand and leaned down intending to press the technique onto his foes head and then gripped his chest as pain with his other.

"K...kai..."

He stumbled back and was supported by Jiraiya

Orochimaru let out a rasping laugh, which was quickly choked out in pain as he released the hand sign he had formed.

Gritting his teeth against the pain, Minato Namikaze pushed away from his sensei and fell across the prone snake user. There was a small blue flash and they both lay still.

Jiraiya rolled his student off of his old teammate, and held him tenderly up on his bent knee.

"What happened...Minato?"

_*****cough* _"He...released... the summoning..."

First Jiraiya's eyes opened wide then closed in grief as he realized he would watch his student die for the second time.

He looked towards Orochimaru only to see him staring vacantly up at the sky. His mouth open in a silent scream as long lines of seals extending out from where the Fourth had gripped his forehead. They entwined themselves around his entire body, along his chakra pathways that ran throughout his broken body.

When they had finished covering his coils, the seals lost their glow and remained in place on his skin, sealing all of the snakes chakra away within his own body, forever.

This was an ancient, painful technique to endure, however it wouldn't kill the person it was used on. The point was to force them to live. And had thus far only been used this one time in the history of the village. Thus was the severity of the threat he posed.

The barrier around them began to waver and them collapsed as the area was engulfed in smoke. Jiraiya felt four presences run by in the cover of the smoke, but with all they had been through, he didn't even try to stop them from taking Orochimaru.

Several of those watching tried to follow but were blocked my a massive wall of webbing that had been erected by a boy with six arms.

Then they were gone. Those who had watched the titanic battle gathered around the two fallen Hokage.

Kakashi knelt down beside his sensei, and placed trembling hands on his arm.

"...M...Minato-sensei..."

The Yondiame, who's skin had taken on a deathly gray color looked up at him and smiled warmly.

"Kakashi...given up on being an ANBU?" The Jonin matched his smile, though none could tell, and the Fourth looked over his shoulder catching a glimpse of his two students.

"And those are your students?" The two began to figit under his gaze. He looked around as if looking for something.

"...only two...?"

Kakashi's visible eye widened and he turned so sharply that Sakura flinched.

"Both of you, get Naruto over here NOW!"

Neither moved, not exactly understanding what was going on, He was about to repeat it when he felt a restraining hand on his arm.

"No...there isn't... time...Kakashi..."

"But..." He couldn't bring himself to say it.

"I... would love... to see him...grown...but not...like this..." Kakashi took his hand in his, and the fingers began to crumble. Kakashi squeezed his eyes shut against the image. When he opened them again a single tear rolled down his cheek.

"...With...you as his...teacher...I...know he...must be...strong..."

Sakura leaned in close to Sasuke. "What are they talking about? What would Kakashi-sensei want us to get Naruto?"

Sasuke let the questions go without comment as he gazed down at the two, or more specifically at the Fourth Hokage. At his fading yellow hair, and deep blue eyes.

It began to dawn on him. "...oh..."

"When...he is...ready..."

"I know Sensei...I still have it safe." He paused for a moment, then continued in a soft gentle voice. "He looks just like you, you know." then he laughed. "But he gets all of his personality from his mother."

This caused him to let out a laugh, that was followed by a coughing fit, which caused his decay to hasten.

The Fourth focused on the view presented to him of his village. Now broken and still smoking in a few places, but the sun was now shining down on his face, and to Kakashi, it seemed he had never been more at peace, nor so full of pride at the beauty of his home.

"I'm...glad...that I... had... this... time........."

He never finished his sentence.

The Fourth Hokage of Konoha, dissolved into dust and ash and, taken by the wind was scattered across the village, he had given his life, twice, to defend.

Kakashi, his two students, and Jiraiya bowed their heads in silent prayer, before being pulled back to their thoughts.

"HOKAGE-SAMA!"

The two older ninja looked on in horror at the still from of the Third.

* * *

_'...so...this is what death is like..." *drip*_

Naruto felt a cool wet spot on his cheek. Curiously, he wiped the water off of his face and opened his eyes. He hadn't even realized they were closed.

He took in his surroundings, and found that he was in some sort of tunnel, water leaked in from above, though he couldn't see quite from where. His first thought was that he had fallen into some kind of sewer or emergency tunnel that ran under the village.

Naruto slowly got to his feet and, was somewhat surprised that he could do so, when only moments ago he had been barley able to raise his own head.

Then a horrifying thought intruded on his mind. _'How long have I been down here?'_

As he walked in search of a way out he also checked himself over for injuries...and found not even a single scratch, nor even a spec of dirt. That was strange in itself, considering he seemed to be underground. And then there was his stamina...he could still feel the fatigue of chakra exhaustion, or rather he knew he could still feel it, but in a sort of detached way. As if it were a sound carrying from a long distance.

Around him the tunnel steadily grew bigger until he found himself in some kind of junction. The tunnel opened into a large room, whose walls reached up into the empty black void above.

He wandered into the center of the room still looking upward, scanning the blackness for any trace of light that might point to a way out, and lost his footing when he slipped on a wet patch of floor and landed in a big puddle of water.

Mentally cursing his own clumsiness he began to shake out his long sleeves to rid them of the heavy liquid.

He tried to stand again only to loose his footing a second time, and landed face first in the water.

He was about to try again when he felt something strange come over him. He was beginning to feel slightly more energized, as if he'd just taken half a soldier pill. The sensation felt as far away as the exhaustion had a minute ago, but he could definitely tell that something was happening.

He examined the water he was laying in. It seemed thick and almost oily, but still it was undeniably clean and even pure somehow. He scooped a small amount into his hands and watched as it was absorbed into his skin, and he felt another small spike in his energy.

"What is this stuff?"

"**HAHAHAHA!"** there was a resounding laughter throughout the room and Naruto flew to his feet reaching for one of his scroll pouches, only to find nothing, not even a kunai. All of his weapons and tools were gone.

"**You really are a fool, Boy." **

"Who's there? Show yourself!"

Behind him he could hear the sound of something sharp being dragged across the stone floor. He slowly turned to see nothing, not even the other side of the large room, everything on that side of the room seemed to be swallowed up in darkness.

Naruto walked forward tentatively, wishing for at least the reassuring feel of a kunai in his hand, instead he could only ball up his fist, holding them so tightly his nails drew blood from his palms.

Ahead he caught the small glint as the low light in the room, he still couldn't identify the source, reflected off of something.

A few more steps and he could see a large opening in the wall, and as he drew closer still he found that it was covered with bars.

The sheer size of the barred door made him feel small ind insignificant. He stopped moving as he saw something on the other side shift. He squinted into the shadows beyond, unwilling to move closer, but still wanting to know what was in there.

"**Tell me, Boy, are all humans so pathetic or just you?"**

The deep malice filled voice came from beyond the bars.

"Who...what are you?"

"**...Just you then..."**

Naruto was growing angry at the insults. "What the hell are you going on about?"

_***sigh***_** "The Ichibi, Boy. Shukaku...can you not even defeat a weakling like him by yourself?!"**

"Shukaku..you mean Gaara's demon?"

"**Not quite so dumb after all..."**

Naruto gritted his teeth. He'd just had enough.

The blond strode towards the bars, heedless of the feeling that he should be running from this person...thing?...rather than confronting it.

"That's it! I've about had it with yo..WOAH!"

The boy barely hopped back in time when a large red, wickedly clawed hand came down right where he had been standing. The hand...paw?...was slowly drawn back into the bars, it's claws leaving deep gashed in the stone floor.

As the blond stared at the marks he was aware of a slight burning sensation on his stomach, but as the burning sensation faded, so too did the scratches in the floor.

He looked again into the darkness behind the bars, a thought occurring to him, as he felt the anger of the thing all around him.

"Where am I?"

"**Currently?...in a clearing outside of your village, laying on your broken puppet, but if you mean this place...your stomach."** Naruto was in shock. **"Or more specifically, inside the chakra pathways that surround your stomach."**

The boy placed his hand over his midsection, right over where he had felt the burning feeling, which must have been the gouges on the floor.

Damage to the floor...to his chakra coils...on his stomach right where the seal...

"...The Kyuubi..."

"**Took you long enough, Brat." **Slowly the beast emerged from the shadows, or did the shadows recede fro him, he couldn't be sure. All he did know was that he was now staring at the most feared beast in existence...and it lived in his stomach.

Naruto burst out laughing, much to the Demons ire,

As his anger grew, so too did the reddish light withing the cage. After a moment the demon slammed his fist against the cage, causing Naruto to grip his stomach as if someone had just kicked him.

"**I did not bring you here to mock me, Brat!"**

That sobered the boy. " 'Brought me!?' What the hell do you mean brought me!?"

"**You nearly got us both _KILLED!_"** The echo of the snarling tone carried throughout the room.

"What more do you expect me to do?! I didn't exactly thing I'd be needing to put weapons in that puppet for the exam finals!"

The fox settled down a bit.

"**What _can_ you do?"**

Naruto grew sullen, and tapped the dry floor with his foot.

"Not much...I'm about out of chakra. I couldn't even get my puppet moving again, even if it's still in one piece, which I doubt."

The demon paused as if considering something, though Naruto got the distinctive impression that the fox was just suppressing a smile.

"**If you had more chakra...could you win?"**

"Where the hell am I supposed to get more chakra?"

"**COULD YOU WIN?!"**

Naruto nearly leapt backward and began nodding furiously.

"**So be it then."**

Without warning, a thick red mist began leaking out of the bars, while a red liquid began to bubble up from the ground.

"Woah! What the hell is this?!"

"**You'd better not fail, Boy. If we die, I'm dragging you to hell with me."**

The mist over took him, and his skin felt as if it were on fire. He fell to his knees convulsing wildly, wracked with pain he didn't notice the red liquid begin to cover him until it overtook his head.

His vision was filled with red that faded to white, and he vanished from the tunnel chamber.

From withing the cage, the fox allowed a low rumbling laughter to escape his lips.

* * *

A scream filled his ears as the white faded from his vision. At first he thought is was Shukaku again, but it was too small a sound, too human. He heard it again and instantly he knew.

"...Hinata-chan..."

Naruto focused his attention on the monster that stood nearby. In his massive hand he held Hinata up by her broken arm, dangling her helplessly as a child would a small toy. He laughed, obviously amused by the girls pain.

As he watched, Naruto gripped the wood still sticking out of his leg and yanked it free, not noticing the wound stitching itself back together again. He stood and flexed his hands, looking idly at the claws that had grown on his nails.

He had never felt stronger, a red aura covered him from head to toe, and he vaguely remembered feeling something like this before. Once, in what almost seemed another life, he had experienced something similar, but could not remember where.

He stared up at the demon tormenting his friend, and gritted his teeth, sharp fangs bit into his lips and he tasted blood. He looked around him at what was left of his puppet. It was missing it's tail, and front leg, It was covered in cracks of splintered wood, but still might be sturdy enough to move.

He'd find out one way or the other.

He channeled the strange red chakra into his hands and out through them towards the connection points of his puppet.

Once the connection was made, the demonic chakra began to flow through the strings and into the puppet, filling it with it's potency, as water fills a bucket.

He felt the chakra fill his puppet to the brim, he felt connected to it in a way that he never had before.

Shukaku stopped his torture of the small girl when he felt a familiar feeling come over him. He looked around him seeking it's source, and was drawn by an increasingly angry malice behind him. It was that annoying kid... still alive and on his feet.

He was generating that awful chakra.

And then he understood, that chakra, both similar and yet far more potent than his own, was also demonic. This boy had a demon inside him as well, and for a moment Shukaku relished the thought of killing another demon container and consuming the demons power for himself.

Until he recognized just who's chakra that was.

Now he only thought of escaping.

Slowly the Fox Puppet pushed itself up on it's single front leg. It faltered, then a mass of chakra shot out of the joint and connected to the fallen limb from where it sat a few yards away.

Naruto pulled hard on the chakra and the leg was pulled along with it to connect back to the joint it had been separated from. He brought the fox to it's full height, and glared menacingly at Shukaku.

The Youki danced along the wooden sides of the puppet, burning off the paint, and singeing it a dark bloody red. The chakra surged at the rear of it's new host and sprouted a tail made of the evil chakra...then a second.

Shukaku's gold eyes met the now crimson eyes of the Leaf Jinchuriki, and he knew fear.

"**Let...her...go..." **the soft spoken command caused him to tremble.

"**K...Kyuubi...sama..."**

Holding onto the girl for whatever protection she might provide, the sand-demon fired two blasts of air at the other demonic boy.

In response, the two tails lifted up and folded over him like a shield. The chakra tails seemed to cut through the attacks, with no effect to their target.

The demon's eyes widened.

"**Now...my turn."**

The Fox lurched forward, faster, than before, and slammed right into the demon, knocking the wounded the wounded Hinata free of it's grip. The fox pinned the sand demon to the ground, and it's two tails stabbed down into Shukaku's massive body. The tails pinned the monster to the ground, and the Kyuubi's chakra seemed to counteract the other chakra contained within the sand.

Hinata fell free towards the ground, and was caught by a string of red chakra, which which swung her up to rest in the arms of the young puppeteer.

Naruto knelt down to examine the girl as she cradled her broken arm. It looked as though the shoulder had also been dislocated by the monster.

He placed the, thankfully, unconscious girl down on the puppet and stared at the still sleeping Gaara **"Wakey...wakey..."**

Naruto pushed off of the puppet falling towards the boy, with his fist held back.

Sand tried to intercept him, only to offer minimal resistance, as the cloak of red chakra seemed to rip right through it like paper.

Before his feet touched down his fist slammed into the side of the boy's head, launching him free of the sand that had him buried from the waist down. Gaara rolled, across the head of the demon for a moment before latching on to the surface. He raised his head and stared open-mouthed at him.

Through his connection to Shukaku he had seen the entire fight. He had seen what the Kyuubi Jinchuriki had done, to him and to his demon prisoner. He knew what terrible power the boy was capable of, and he also knew that Naruto had first seen to the safety of the white-eyed girl, before finishing them off.

It confused and scared him at the same time. That one so powerful, could care so much about another, it was an alien concept to him.

Shukaku was livid, in all his years trapped within Gaara, he never thought he would encounter the most powerful of the tailed beasts like this. He could feel his consciousness being pulled back behind his seal now that the boy was awake. He could only stare at the wooden fox that now stood atop his sand body.

To his absolute horror, the blue wooden eyes of the puppet bled to a deep crimson, and moved to stare at him. He saw mirth in those eyes, and as his mind was trapped once again in the deepest recesses of Gaara's mind, he could hear the Demon Fox laughing.

Gaara gripped his head as his demon was trapped again, His bod began to writhe in pain as the chakra that had been inside the sand was reabsorbed.

Naruto likewise, was doubled over with pain as the Kyuubi's chakra was absorbed back into the seal.

Without the chakra to support it, the sand body of Shukaku, began to dissolve into an avalanche of sand, sending the two boys rolling across the ground, along with the Fox puppet and a still unconscious Hinata.

The Sand Nin just lay there unable to move. The chakra exhaustion had set in now and he was helpless. His head rolled to the side, he no longer even had the strength to hold it up.

He focused on movement a short distance away. He blinked to clear his vision and saw the blond boy crawling towards him.

_'...still he comes...'_ Panic began to set in.

"Get back! Leave me alo..."

Naruto stopped at a small pile of sand half way between the two, and brushed away the sand from Hinata's face, while he checked for a pulse. It found it, beating strong and steadily, and he exhaled a sigh of relief then collapsed lifelessly next to her on the ground.

"How...how were you able to defeat Shukaku?"

Naruto looked back at his fellow demon container. "I...had...no choice." He gulped down a ragged breath. "It...was him or...my home."

The two boys lapsed into silence, and a very short while later, two ANBU, along with the two branch members of the Hyuuga clan from earlier, arrived on the scene. The two ANBU immediately tended to the two Jinchuriki, while the two Hyuuga carried Hinata to the hospital.

The one with a bear mask placed a tag of some kind onto Gaara's head, and took him into custody.

"Uzumaki-san are you injured?"

The ANBU nearest him, a kunoichi with purple hair and a cat mask, looked into his eyes looking for his pupil dilation.

He shook his head to indicate that he wasn't. "The...village..."

"I's over. We've pushed them all back. Rest, I'll get you to the hospital."

Naruto smiled and closed his eyes. The hospital...he hated it there, but just this once...he wasn't going to argue.

_'...I did it...they're safe...Chiyo-sensei...I...did...it...'_

The two ANBU gathered up their charges, and turned to look up at the mountain of sand as a section shifted and fell away to reveal a large wooden blue eye staring lifelessly at nothing.

* * *

AN: I'm sorry about the overlong delay in getting this up. The computer that contained it was holding it hostage, and it took Ibiki and a team of interrogation specialists to get it out. May it rest in peaces.

Any way I've had a lot of changes in my life since I posted the last chapter. I got married, I moved...yeah my life isn't the same, but still this story will continue. Wait till you see what happens.

I thought the scene with the Fourth and Kakashi after the fight with Orochimaru was my favorite in this story so far, what do you think?

R&R


	16. Chapter 16

Puppets of the Leaf

Chapter 16

By Riotv2

Naruto's eyes opened and, with a groan, he recognized the sterile white ceilings of the Hospital room he was now occupying.

"Naruto?"

He hadn't realized anyone else was in the room, but in less than a moment his vision was filled with the concerned green eyes of his pink-haired teammate.

"H...hey Sakura..." He tried to sit up, however his head still swam with vertigo, a result of exhausting so much of his chakra, and he had to lean back down.

"Don't...just rest..." he said as she helped ease him back down. "..here drink this..."

She pressed a cup to his lips and poured some cool water into his mouth.

"Thanks...how long...?"

"Only a few hours." she said replacing the cup on a table next to his bed. She then made a note of what time he woke up on his medical chart,then headed for the door.

"I have to go, they're still bringing in the wounded, but I'll let Sensei kn ow your awake, In the meantime...just try to rest, and I'll check in on you later."

Naruto was relieved that she seemed to be ok. He'd never tell her, but he was proud of how well she was doing as a medic.

"What about Hinata-chan?"

Sakura paused at the door and turned to look at him. "she was brought in just before you were. Her arm was torn up pretty badly, broken forearm and she dislocated that same shoulder...but other than a few minor chakra burns... she be ok." She smiled weakly at him, and he could see how tired she was. The aspiring medic then opened the door and disappeared into the hall, however this gave him a brief look out into said hallway to see what he could only describe as pure chaos. Doctors were screaming out orders left and right while nurses ran back and forth carrying bags of blood. Men and women were screaming out in pain.

The flood of noises were drowned out again as the door clicked shut behind her. Naruto tried to look around him, and saw that a curtain had been pulled across between him and the other bed.

He glanced out of the rooms only, fairly large window. He couldn't see any of the village from where he lay, but the view he had of the sky was soothing to him, and he soon found his eyes closing once again.

…...

It must have been several hours later, when Naruto heard a lighthearted giggle coming from somewhere within the room. He opened his eyes to see his Sensei sitting in the window reading his little orange book. Zabuza's sword sat leaning against the wall next to the open window.

"Kakashi-sensei..."

"Yo..." The Jonin put away the book and approached the bed.

"How are you feeling, Naruto?"

"Like I used up all me chakra then got his by a solid wall of sand...You?" This time when Naruto tried to get up, he didn't get as dizzy and was able to move to a full upright sitting position.

The Jonin's one visible eye smiled at him. "Good, then I guess you're well enough to receive visitors."

"Visitors?"

"Hai, hai, he's been waiting in the hallway for you to wake up."

As he said this the older ninja walked over to the door and opened it a crack, speaking to someone outside. Then, he stepped aside opening the door. Stepping aside, a man in light gray robes walked in slowly. He had shoulder length black hair and white eyes. His arm, and part of his face were bandaged.

"Uzumaki-sama..." He bowed low in respect. "I am glad to see you well."

Naruto studied his face for a moment, not recognizing him, though he looked some what familiar. Naruto had never had much contact with members of their clan, other than Hinata and Neji.

"Uhh...thanks...I'm sorry, you are?"

The man, about Kakashi's age, smiled. "It's ok, I didn't really expect you to recognize me. I just wanted to thank you for protecting Hinata-sama like you did, as well as the whole village." he bowed low again in thanks as Naruto, finally placed him.

Ohh, I see you were one of those guys trying to protect Hinata and her father from Gaara...um...?"

"Yes, my name is Hyuga, Himoto. My brother Hieh, also wished me to express his gratitude. He would've come himself, however he is still with Hinata-sama."

"Uhh...don't worry about it...how is she anyway?"

"She is well. She awoke not long ago, and inquired about you, which I why I was able to come pay my respects, you see."

Naruto was beginning to grow warm as the blood rushed to his face with all the praise and thanks the man was lavishing on him.

"I...it's ok...really you guys don't have to thank me... What about her dad, is he ok?" He asked urgently, trying to change the subject.

At this question, Himoto cast his eyes downward, and he shook his head sadly.

"Hiashi-sama..."

Naruto's shoulders dropped. I'm...sorry..."

He was at a loss for words, though he didn't know the man personally, and despite everything he had heard about his treatment towards Hinata, he had come to respect him for his actions during the invasion.

The silence permeated the room for a moment, before Himoto, bowed again in thanks and left the room.

Afterward, Naruto was still quiet. To distracting him, Kakashi sat on the end of the bed and told him about each of the Rookie Nine.

He told him how Sasuke had been off training on his own, ever since the end of the war. "perfecting a new technique" he had told Kakashi. Naruto had been surprised to learn that it was now the second day after the fighting stopped.

Sakura, he knew was still helping out in the hospital, though the doctor had ordered her to bed to recover her strength. She was back at work that very morning.

He laughed when he found out that Shikamaru, after running into his team in the stadium, had been ordered to spend the invasion in a shelter protecting the civilians there. Naruto could just picture the Nara debating with himself about weather it was more troublesome to be out fighting for his village, or stuck in a confined space with Ino.

Shino, who had also been near the stadium at the time, has been told to escort a group of walking wounded to the hospital, and was then tasked to defend the building with several others.

Akamaru had spent the invasion trying to wake up Kiba, who had fallen asleep with the civilians. A fact that Naruto made a note to tease him endlessly about.

Naruto breathed a bit easier knowing that all the people he cared about were ok...except...

"Ne, Kakashi-sensei, what about the Old Man? What happened with that Snake-teme?"

The Jonin visibly flinched, and Naruto sat bolt up right despite the slight pain involved with the movement.

"Kakashi-sensei...is he...?"

Kakashi refused to meet his gaze and Naruto had his answer.

He fell quite again in a silent prayer to the man who had been a grandfather to him. To Kakashi, it seemed as though the bright light that had always possessed Naruto had gone out of him in that instant.

Kakashi got up to leave after patting the boy's shoulder for support.

"By the way, Gai said to let you know that Ten-ten has your puppets at her fathers shop, and you can pick them up whenever you feel up to it, but you'll have to get that giant one yourself, it was too big to move."

Naruto looked up blankly, now worrying about more of his friends, and feeling guilty that he hadn't asked sooner.

"...what about Neji and Lee, are they ok too?"

The Jonin looked back over his shoulder. "Lee was fighting in the stadium along with us. He's fine except for some torn ligaments."

Naruto felt a lump in his throat. "...and Neji?"

Kakashi didn't answer, he just looked over at the other bed in the room, the one hidden behind the curtain. His gaze lingered there for a moment then he walked out into the hallway.

Naruto stared at the curtain. All the time he'd been awake, he wasn't even aware that anyone else was in the bed.

"...Neji...?" There was no response.

Cautiously, Naruto threw off his blanket and slid off the bed. His legs wobbled a bit as the dizziness returned, but he had to see for himself.

Using a chair for support, Naruto made his way to the curtain and pulled it aside.

A breath he hadn't even known he was holding escaped him as he looked down on the young Hyuga. He had been expecting some gruesome injury, or for him to be covered in bandages from head to toe rather than just around his forehead.

Instead he was just lying there, as if in a deep sleep.

Naruto picked up his medical chart from the end of his bed and looked it over.

_Name: Hyuga, Neji_

_Rank: Genin_

_Sensei: Might Gai_

_Massive neurological trauma to the Frontal Lobe._

_Keep on Life support._

The rest went on to list the various treatments and medications he had received.

"Neji, man...what the hell happened to you?"

"He's still not awake yet?"

Naruto turned to the doorway to see the doctor that had treated them both the last time they were there enter the room.

The man walked over to them and took the chart from Naruto giving it a once over and making a not or two.

"It's good to see you up and around at any rate. How are you feeling?"

"A little tired."

"That's to be expected, but I'll have to give you a quick examination to see if you are fit to be released. We still have a lot of wounded and we'll need to room."

"I understand. Do you know...what happened to him?"

"Well..." He said glancing at Neji again. "The report I read, stated that he was hit by an enemy genjutsu of an unknown type. He's been in a coma ever since."

Naruto thought this odd, since he had fought Neji, he didn't think he was the kind of person who would allow himself to be hit like that.

"It's odd...I always thought that the Hyuga Bloodline made genjutsu useless against them..."

The doctor seemed to shrug this off though as a 'live and learn' thing. "Still the incident was witnessed by one of their Elders, so I guess they would know better than me."

Naruto nodded absently. Something didn't feel right about this, his mind attributed it to seeing one of his friends in such a condition, but still...his heart told him otherwise.

…...

Shortly after the Doctor completed his examination of Naruto, Izumo, one of the proctors from the Chunin Exam, entered the room to make a report of everything Naruto had seen during the invasion. It hadn't taken long for the boy to recount everything that had happened to him, but he made sure that he left out the parts concerning the Demon Fox, however Izumo, having already gathered a report from ANBU about it, asked him directly for the information, specifically if there was any chance the Demon could be breaking free.

To Naruto's surprise the questions were asked without malice. In fact the Chunin was quite respectful during that part, and almost relieved and friendly when Naruto assured him the Fox was contained.

Now the young Puppeteer found himself outside walking the streets of the village, after being released from the hospital, and visiting Lee and the others who were still there, Hinata however he learned had been taken back to the Hyuga compound for further treatment.

He wasn't sure how to feel about that. He had wanted to offer his condolences to her about her father, but...he just could find the words to do so.

The village was a wreak. There wasn't an undamaged building anywhere in sight, as he walked in the general direction of his home. The more he saw the more depressed he became.

Now he wasn't quite sure what to do with himself. Izumo had said he was on suspended duty so he could rest up. No missions or training would be allowed while things were being worked out.

That was fine, he didn't much feel up to anything like that anyway. Down the street he could see Ichiraku's, one wall had a hole in it, but there was a table outside the stand, and he could see the old man and his daughter filling bowls for a small line of people.

He thought about getting some himself, but decided that he just wasn't hungry. The idea of eating Ramen only reminded him of when the Hokage had taken him there for his last birthday for and all he could eat meal.

Finally he decided to just go collect his puppets and then go home. He could at least see Tenten and maybe she could tell him something about Neji.

But as it turned out, she wasn't at home, her Father however had been glad to see that he was ok. He helped Naruto re-seal his puppets into their scrolls and then informed him that he'd have to go get his giant fox himself, since it was too large for the man to move himself.

He remembered Kakashi telling him this also, and thanked him for his help. As he was leaving though, the man told him how sorry he was about the Hokage, and that he knew they had been close.

It was like a stab in an already wounded heart.

…...

Naruto looked up at the mountain of sand covering his puppet. All he could see from this side was one giant blue eye and an outstretched paw, which Naruto sat down on, pulling one knee close to his chest as he set his chin on it.

"I heard it was an impressive battle."

Naruto turned to find his old academy instructor walking into the clearing.

"Iruka-sensei..."

Iruka sat next to him on the paw and whistled up at the sheer size of the puppet his 'little brother' had created. This brought a small smile to his face, the first since he had woken up in the hospital.

"So you heard about the Third then..." It wasn't a question.

"...hai..."

"You know...The Third Love this village with all of his heart. When the Fourth died an the Third took office again...he said that it was the job of the Hokage to defend the village...and that giving their lives in service to their home and people was something they were all glad to do."

Naruto pondered that for a moment, and could see the old man saying it with a smile.

"He loved you like a grandson, Naruto...the Hokage's not supposed to play favorites, but...I think he knew that one day you'd be sitting in his chair."

Naruto chuckled a bit at this. "...Hai...I know."

The two sat engaged in small talk about the Hokage for a while until silence overtook them, and they just sat enjoying the peace of the forest, and the gentle breeze in the air.

After a few minutes of this, Iruka nudged Naruto with his elbow. "So...can you really move this thing? I mean...it's huge."

Naruto smiled, a real smile as they stood up and Naruto attached his chakra strings to the puppet through the sand. It took some wiggling, but slowly the large fox rose from the sand.

For effect, Naruto had it shake itself in the manner of a living canine, dowsing them both with loose sand. Iruka glared at Naruto halfheartedly.

Ignoring his old teacher Naruto began to inspect his creation.

It's surface had been singed to a nearly crimson orange, and several cracks had formed along it's body, however it was still somewhat sound and, aside from it's missing tail, would take surprisingly little time to repair. The metal joint on the leg that had come off had even fused back on due to the intensity of the Demon's chakra.

"Wow...I can't believe you can even make it move, let alone fight effectively with it..."

Iruka took a few steps forward to get a closer look.

"Well I wasn't really expecting to use it at all...I only built it to teach that Perverted Sage a lesson. I didn't even equip it with any weapons...and it takes a lot of concentration...if there were two enemies, I'd have been screwed. It's size requires all ten of my chakra strings."

Iruka looked at him in pride as Naruto resealed the puppet along with it's missing tail back into it's scroll which he slung on his back. _'You really have grown Naruto...'_

"Come on, I promised Ayami-chan we'd stop by for lunch so she could fuss over you."

…...

After a brief lunch at Ichiraku's, Iruka left saying that he had things to do, and that he would see Naruto later.

So now Naruto found himself standing in front of a large pile of rubble...which used to be his home. The image of one of Shukaku's massive Air Bullets crashing it's way through the village, and right through his building.

Not far from the rubble was his refrigerator, which was lying on top of his couch. There was no other recognizable sign of the rest of his furniture. In sheer frustration, Naruto kicked at a large piece of wood, that might have been a table...or a door.

He didn't even bother to see where it landed, as his attention was now fixed on what had been sitting under it.

Sudden horrified realization gripped him as he picked up the small black scroll and dusted it off. He knew the scroll well, it had been one of many that he had read over the course of his life. In all he had five similar to the one in his hand, along with two much larger ones, that contained all the knowledge of puppetry, given to him by his first sensei, Elder Chiyo of Suna.

They were all lost in the sea of rubble before him.

With nothing else to do he quickly began looking, and kept at it for a few hours, only coming up with one of the larger scrolls, the first set he had completed, and one of the other small scrolls.

There was still a long way to go.

…...

Naruto was loosing track of time, to him it felt like nearly the entire day had passed since he'd begun his search, but when he checked the angle of the sun, it had only been an few hours.

He still hadn't looked through all of the rubble, but was determined to do so.

Soon he heard the sounds of running footsteps coming from around the corner.

"KONOHAMARU-KUN! Wait! Come back..."

Naruto had just barely registered the name when a small boy in a long blue scarf came rushing around the corner with tears streaming from his eyes.

"...Konohamaru..."

The boy kept running right passed him, but stopped when he noticed that his feet no longer touched the ground.

He looked around him in shock to see that he was being held up in the air by a group of chakra strings.

He followed them to their source to see Naruto looking at him with an expression of concern.

"Konohamaru, what's going on?" He asked as he let the boy down and took a step forward, only to be knocked back as the Thirds grandson barreled into him.

"BOSS!" The boy cried as he threw his arms around Naruto's waist and began to sob louder.

Naruto returned the kids desperate hug, and saw an out of breath Moegi and Udon coming towards them.

After getting Konohamaru to let go and calm down a bit he sat them all down on his refrigerator and tried to get the whole story out of them.

Apparently he had just found out about his Grandfather from his Uncle Asuma, Shikamaru's sensei, and was so upset he ran away from his uncle.

Naruto tried his best to console the boy and his friends, and wound up repeating much of what Iruka had told him only hours before. Finally Konohamaru had stopped crying, but was still in a somber mood, which just broke Naruto's heart.

"Hey...how about you three helping me out with something?"

The three perked up a bit at their hero asking for their help.

"With what Naruto-nisan?"

"Well I need to find more of these black scrolls in that pile over there..." He held up one of the small scrolls he had found.

He didn't even get to finish before the three ran headlong into the pile and began to work their way through it.

Shaking his head Naruto joined them in the search just as Moegi began jumping up and down while holding one of the missing small scrolls.

It took nearly till sundown, but the four of them managed to find the two remaining small scrolls plus the other big one, which had been stuck in a tree.

The three much happier, and dirtier children were once again sitting atop the refrigerator, listening to Naruto describe, much exaggerated for them, his battle with Gaara.

"Ohh so this is where you three are..."

Naruto and the others turned to see Kakashi and Ebisu striding towards them. The grey-haired Jonin, looking at what was left of Naruto's apartment building as they went.

"Honored Grandson, I have been looking all over for you."

"We've been helping Naruto-nisan look for his scrolls." Answered Moegi, while the other two nodded in agreement.

Ebisu almost looked as though he was ready to deliver one of his lectures, and the children knew it, however, considering that they were ok, and with all they'd been through today, he thought better of it.

"I see, but you had best get home. There's still a curfew in effect for all academy students."

The children looked disappointed, but reluctantly got down off of the fridge. Moegi and Udon, living in the opposite direction of Konohamaru started walking together into the fading light, while the Thirds grandson lingered for a moment to give his hero another hug.

"And you Uzumaki-san, I'm afraid that the curfew applies to Genin as well."

Naruto jerked a thumb at the pile of rubble next to them.

"I am home."

This caught Konohamaru off guard, as if it hadn't dawned on him why, exactly, they were looking for the scrolls in the rubble to begin with.

"You...you lived here Boss?"

"Mmhhmm..." He nodded with a smile.

In response the boy grabbed his arm and began pulling on it. "C'mon, you can stay with me!"

Naruto balked at that, trying comically to keep his balance, while the, surprisingly, strong boy seemed intent on dragging him all the way home. He shot a glance to the two Jonin, only to receive smiles and a nod of approval from Ebisu.

Naruto had just enough time to grab his few belongings, which they had placed into his backpack, no slightly ripped in places from being in the fallen building, and followed the excited child to his home, which shocked Naruto because it was located directly next to the Hokage's tower.

Naruto stared open-mouthed at the immaculately kept gardens and the flowing, tranquil ponds. "Konohamaru...this place is amazing."

"Yup." There were a few servants around here and there tending to the houses needs, but otherwise there were very few people in the area.

"Are you sure your parents will be ok with this?"

They boy's head dropped sullenly as they walked. "...They're...with Grandpa..." A tear rolled down the boys cheek, shortly followed by a second, and Naruto mentally slapped himself.

_'Great going, Dobe!'_

"Hey, I'm sorry..." Konohamaru shook it off.

"No, It's ok, they died a long time ago, It was just me and Grandpa here."

"What about your Uncle?"

"Well, Uncle Asuma is technically, my godfather, but he was always gone on missions stuff so I came here after Dad died."

They entered the main household and Konohamaru showed him around.

"How old were you?"

"Three...here, this is my room!" The boy was getting really excited, and Naruto was amazed at his resiliency. Already without parents, he had just lost he Grandfather and was all along in this big house, yet he still had a smile on his face.

_'...well I guess he's not alone...I'm here...'_

Naruto took the tour of the room, there were a lot of pictures, even on of him with Konohamaru and his friends, taken just before the Exam started. Clothes were piled up in a corner, and small toys littered the room. All in all it matched the boys energy and personality perfectly.

After a moment they returned to the small living room where her had left his belongings, and they just decided to relax for a while. Konohamaru pulled out a Shogi board from a closet, and began to set it up for them.

Naruto wasn't very good...but then neither was Konohamaru, so it was still a close match. Eventually they grew bored and began inventing outlandish moves and rules that defied the very laws of physics. Soon Konohamaru randomly stood up and pronounced himself the winner on account of the fact that he had made the first move.

They both laughed too hard for Naruto to protest.

"Ne, Boss?"

"Hmm?" the blonde replied as he reset the board.

"Where's your family?" Konohamaru asked hesitantly.

The puppet user never even paused. "I don't have one."

Konohamaru looked shocked. For the most part, all of his contact with the older ninja had been about playing games, or just having fun. They had never actually talked like this before.

"None?"

Naruto finished setting up the next game. "Nope, never knew my parents, I'm not even sure if they're alive or not."

He was speaking nonchalantly, as if the topic didn't bother him at all. But Konohamaru could see different.

"You...you don't even know who they are?"

Nope...It's ok though, I had the 'Old Man'. Your Grandfather checked in on me when he could, to make sure I was ok or that I didn't need anything."

The game tiles clicked as he made the first move.

"In fact... he was the one to took me to Suna when I was a kid, that's where I first learned about puppets."

The boy's eyes lit up. "Woa, really?"

"Yup..." at that, Naruto used nearly invisible chakra strings to lift the Shogi tiles off of the board and used them to 'attack' the boy before him. In response Konohamaru invented a new Jutsu that involved hitting Naruto with a pillow as hard as he could.

Soon a servant came to tell them that dinner was ready. The old woman was smiling at their antics and as the two walked by she whispered, "Thank you..." into the blonds ear.

Over dinner, Konohamaru asked a lot of questions about Suna, and what Naruto had done there. Naruto answered the questions, except those about Chiyo, and after dinner he gave him a few demonstrations with his old marionette.

Eventually Konohamaru began to yawn, and Naruto walked him back to his room and put him to bed. As he was about to walk out though, Konohamaru asked another question.

"Hey, Boss...could you...teach...me to use...puppets...too..."

The question had caught Naruto off guard. He had never thought of teaching others how to use them, he wasn't even sure how to go about doing so. He wished, not for the first time, that he could ask Chiyo's advice.

"We'll see." It wasn't the best answer he could give at that moment, but when he was answered by snores, he wasn't even sure the kid had heard him.

…...

It rained the next day, as all of the ninja in the village gathered on top of the Kage Tower, to pay their respects.

Naruto stood in line with his team, and the Konohamaru Corps at the sides. Kakashi, Ebisu, and Iruka behind them.

Everyone was dressed in black, and stood silently as the two counsel members, Homura and Koharu, spoke at the head of the gathering.

"We are here today to honor those who gave their lives to defend our home." The two elders turned and as one everyone gathered on the roof top bowed in respect to the displays set out before them.

To Naruto's right, Konohamaru sounded like he was trying to hold back his tears, so when they all stood back up, Naruto placed his hand on the boy's shoulder in support. Konohamaru rubbed his eyes clear and smiled up at him.

The gesture didn't go unnoticed. Several of the older ninja present, including Iruka and Asuma, smiled too.

Soon all those gathered took turns approaching the table containing the picture of the Third and the Battle Helmet he had worn.

As Naruto approached, his attention was drawn to the tables other occupants. A picture of a man with blond hair and white and red garment of some kind upon which sat a strange three pointed kunai.

Naruto knew the man instantly, there were few who would fail to recognize the greatest ninja in the history of the village. However he was curious as to the reason for it's presence here, now, when he had died a long time ago.

He, along with his team placed their flowers on the table, and said a small prayer before moving on.

As the funeral came to a close, and the people either left or began moving through all of the pictures looking for their loved ones, Naruto found himself continuously looking back at the picture of the Fourth.

"Naruto, you coming?" The blond turned to see Sakura looking at him expectantly. Sasuke was standing not far behind her.

"...what?...no, I think I'll stick around for a while. Thanks though." In truth he was waiting for Konohamaru, as he had promised to take him and his friends for lunch.

"I'll see you guys later."

Sasuke just turned and walked away, while Sakura hesitated for a bit. "Ok, but remember we're meeting tomorrow at the bridge at 8:00 am."

Naruto gave her a smile. "Hai."

She nodded back and followed their other teammate to the stairs.

After they had gone, Naruto noticed that Konohamaru was still talking with Iruka, so he made his way back over to the Kage's pictures, wanting to get another look at the Fourth's famous battle cloak. However , just beyond the first table he spotted Hinata, her arm still in a sling, standing in front of the fathers picture.

Naruto continued past the first table, intending to see if she was ok, but was stopped by an older man, a Hyuga, when he stepped purposefully in front of him.

"...Uzumaki...-san..."

Naruto looked back at his penetrating stare without flinching, a feet that surprised the older man.

"I just wanted to pay my respects to Hinata-chan and her father. Please let me through."

By now they had attracted the attention of several others, including Hinata.

"Hinata-sama in in mourning. As are we all for Hiashi-sama's passing." His voice suddenly took on a sneer of contempt. "Besides, the heiress of our clan has no place associating with... _your kind!_"

Naruto bristled at the, clear, meaning of the man's words. He would love nothing more than to teach the arrogant prick a lesson, however he was conscious of where he was at the moment.

So instead he simply ignored the man altogether. He turned to address his friend and former class-mate directly, who had been watching the exchange with a blush on her face.

"Hinata-chan...I'm sorry... about your dad, I mean. But I'm glad you're doing better."

He kicked himself. It seemed a fairly pathetic thing to say. However the girl's blush deepened.

"Ar...arrigato...Naruto-kun..."

Naruto, not having much else to say, was about to turn around and leave, but stopped.

"...And...I hope Neji gets well again soon too..."

This caused Hinata, who, along with her sister, were being ushered away towards the stairs, to whirl around so fast she was going to fall over.

"W...what about Neji-nisan?"

Naruto's eyes narrowed. "You...haven't heard?"

"Uzumaki! Hinata-sama has been through quite enough already without you disturbing her further!"

Naruto continued to ignore him. "When I woke up in the hospital... he was lying in the bed next to mine...in a coma."

The eyes of several Hyuga widened in shock, and a small murmur had begun to build among those who could hear them.

"C...coma?"

He nodded. "The doctor said he was hit by some kind of genjutsu that..."

"I SAID ENOUGH!"

Now the eyes of all those left at the funeral were directed towards them, and the Elder Hyuga looked around in exasperation before leaning in close to Naruto.

"You walk a dangerous line, Uzumaki, for defying me so."

"And I'm not a member of your clan...so don't expect me to kiss your ass."

Naruto wasn't quite sure what had come over him, but this guy just seamed to scream 'bad-guy'. He just _knew_ that he was up to something.

"Be thankful you are not..._Demon!_"

The man straitened and led the rest of his clan away.

Naruto stared at his back. "Don't worry...I am."

The young Puppeteer felt someone step up behind him, and turned to see his sensei standing there, his book nowhere to be seen.

"You need to watch yourself around that one, Naruto. He has many connections within the village, and almost as much power as the Hokage. He is a very dangerous man."

"I know, Sensei."

Kakashi nodded and then indicated for him to follow. It was only now that Naruto noticed that almost everyone who had attended the funeral had left, and Kakashi was leading him towards a small group of people, most of whom he knew.

Asuma nodded towards him in greeting. "Hey kid, thanks for looking after my nephew for me like you did. I...I haven't had much time for him lately..." The Jonin had adopted a look that almost made him look ashamed.

"It's no sweat, really..."

"Ahem..." The council member, Homura cleared his throat to get every ones attention.

"If you would please...we have business to discuss."

Naruto was now even more confused as Homura nodded to Izumo and Kotetsu, the two Chunin exam proctors.

"Well...as you know of course the exam was never actually finished...however we believe that we have seen enough throughout the rest of the exam, as well as the individual matches to come to a conclusion."

The Chunin opened a file he had with him, and Naruto looked to his teacher for an answer to his confusion. Kakashi, who he could tell was smiling, wouldn't meet his gaze.

"Now, " Izumo continued. " During the first part of the exam, it was noted that only a very few participants were caught cheating less than three times, which was the record of recent years."

The most outstanding of which, from the Leaf, was Aburami Shino...who was later eliminated during the preliminary matches a month ago." The other Chunin filled in.

"How did I do?" Naruto asked, curious to see if anyone managed to catch on to his use of Kyu. Izumo smiled.

"Naruto you were caught once taking something out of your hip pouch, but the proctor who saw it could not identify what is was. Now that you mention it...I was a bit curious about it myself..."

Naruto's smile broadened. "It was video screen, I have small camera's built in to the eyes of my little fox puppet."

The two recalled seeing the puppet during his preliminary exam, and nodded.

Kakashi shook his head. "Naruto, remind me to talk to you about keeping your techniques secret."

"Ibiki-sama also noted you for dispelling the killing intent and stress he had been building to put added pressure on the examinees, and that you managed to inspire courage in those left, even those from other villages. This is a very important thing for a team leader, and was one of the leading contributions to our decision."

"Tch...troublesome..." It was only then that Naruto noticed that Shikamaru was standing next to his sensei.

"As for you, Shikamaru...-"

" I believe we can skip though the report, we have all read it and the two candidates were there, they know what happened during the rest of the tests." interrupted Koharu in an impatient voice.

"A...ano, Kohura-sama...of course we can...The information we have gathered from the exams, in addition to your actions during the invasion, indicate that out of all those remaining participants, you two...Nara Shikamaru and Uzumaki Naruto...are the only ones qualified for promotions at this time."

Naruto was struck speechless, which in itself was amazing. He had to shake his head several times to make sure he wasn't imagining this.

_'...me...i passed the exam...'_

"Sarutobi Asuma...Hatake Kakashi..." Koharu continued. "As the instructors of the candidates...do you endorse their promotion?"

They both nodded. "Hai...I, Hatake Kakashi, Leader of Team 7...fully acknowledge the skill of my student, Uzumaki Naruto and support his promotion to the rank of Chunin."

Naruto looked up at him blankly. He had always wanted to be recognized be those around him...but to hear it declared so openly by his own sensei gave him a feeling that was difficult to describe.

Asuma spoke in a similar fashion in favor of Shikamaru.

The two council members hesitated for a moment, almost as if reluctant to continue.

"Very...well. As of this moment, Nara Shikamaru and...Uzumaki Naruto...are hereby promoted to the rank of Chunin...congratulations."

Naruto cheered, while Shikamaru just grumbled. "...man, what a drag..."

Kakashi and Asuma both reached around their students and placed a light protective vest around their shoulders. Shikamaru's was two-toned, the lighter section being tan, like his normal jacket, while to top part was the traditional olive.

Naruto looked down at his to see that it was a dark gray, almost black in color with an orange swirl on the back instead of the usual red.

"As Chunin, you both will have greater responsibility to the village than before. You will be required to lead teams in the field, especially now that we are officially at war with both the Sand and Sound villages."

"Once the new Hokage arrives, you will both have to present yourselves to finalize the paperwork for the promotion, however, due to recent...losses, we felt it was important to familiarize you both with your new rank as quickly as possible."

The part about a new Kage had caught Naruto's attention. "Excuse me...whats this about a new Kage?"

Homura looked at him in obvious annoyance. "We _are_ in a state of war. If we delayed in choosing a new Hokage, than other villages might see it as a weakness and choose to join with our enemies."

Naruto nodded...it made sense, but still didn't answer all of his questions. "Who is it?"

"Funny you should ask, Gaki."

The sound of wood tapping on the tile of the roof echoed over them, and Naruto turned to see Jiraiya approaching.

"I'm leaving now to go retrieve her. Want to come?"

Naruto grew excited at the prospect of getting out of the village for a while.

"Out of the question." Naruto turned to see Homura glaring at the older ninja. "We suffered too many losses in the invasion, not to mention the many more who were wounded. I'm afraid we cannot allow even one of our _Chunin_ to leave the village on an assignment like that."

Naruto looked distraught, he really wanted to go, but nodded. "They're right Ero-sanin, as much as I'd love to go, I'm needed here. I need to learn exactly what my new duties will be."

The blonds utter exceptance of the Council Members order thoroughly shocked the Thirds old teammates, Not to mention Kakashi and Jiraiya.

But neither could fault him. He loved his village and was absolutely protective of it.

"Ok, I'll see you what I get back then, Brat. It should only be a few days at most." That last seemed to be more directed at the two Council members, more than at him. Jiraiya then diapered in a puff of smoke.

Koharu turned to address the boys, together. "As Uzumaki-san has yet to be officially cleared for duty, you will both have rest of the day off, however tomorrow you are to report to the Academies Administration office. You will both be following Izumo and Kotetsu's orders for the time being."

Without another word, the two elder shinobi descended stairs and disappeared into the building, while to two aforementioned Chunin smiled at them both.

"Don't worry guys, we wont be doing anything much on your first day." States Izumo. Kotetsu winked at them before they too left via the stairs.

Now left alone with their Sensei's, the two newly appointed Chunin stood in silence for a moment before a loud grumble issued from Naruto's stomach.

The blond rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, and turned to look at Kakashi.

"Hey,... Sensei...?"

Kakashi had a sinking feeling in his stomach, and silently mourned the anticipated loss of most of his money.

"_Ahh..._ That was good Kakashi-sensei...It's too bad Shikamaru and Asuma-sensei couldn't come too."

Naruto patted his stomach in contentment. They had gone for lunch at Ichiraku's and Naruto had eaten his fill, much to the delight of the stand owner and his daughter, and they were now walking around the village together. Kakashi had his face hidden behind his book, as usual, and only the fact that is was being held upside down showed that anything was wrong.

Naruto looked up at him when he didn't respond and saw the state of his book.

"Kakashi-sensei?"

Still no response.

Now worried, Naruto tapped him on the arm. The only other time he had seen him like this was during the wave mission after their first encounter with Zabuza.

The sudden contact was like a splash of cold water on him, and he nearly dropped the book.

"Ok... what's wrong..."

Kakashi looked at the boy walking alongside him in his new Chunin Vest, which he had ordered for him after learning of his impending promotion. Busho, the man who owned the weapons shop that Naruto frequented, took only two hours to complete it and didn't even charge him.

He sighed.

"...Naruto...now that you are a Chunin...there are somethings i need to tell you. I've been looking forward to telling you this since you entered the academy...but now that it's come to it...I'm having trouble finding the words."

The seriousness of the situation threw Naruto off a bit and he began looking around them to distract himself, and just then noticed where they were.

"The training grounds?"

Kakashi nodded and indicated that he should follow as he led them to the memorial stone.

The last time Naruto had seen it was when he had overheard Kakashi talking to his dead teammate and sensei.

The stone itself contained a lot more names than before, many having been added within the last few days. Naruto hadn't realized how many people had died in the invasion.

Kakashi knelt down and ran his fingers over the names.

"I once told you about this stone and those who have their names on it..."

Naruto nodded in response. "Hai...I remember...you said that your friends are on it..."

Kakashi nodded and pointed to one name in particular, which Naruto read aloud over his shoulder.

"...Uchiha...Obito..."

"My best friend, and Sasuke's cousin actually, he sacrificed his life to save both mine and our other teammate during the Rock-Leaf War. I had lost my eye and he gave me one of his before he died."

Naruto nodded in understanding. _'...oh so that's how he got the Sharringan...'_

After a moment of silence in which Kakashi seemed to be debating something, he moved on to another name, one that Naruto was slightly familiar with.

"...Namikaze...Minato...oh your old sensei...his names a lot farther down, when did he die?"

Kakashi closed his eyes tightly. "He died...the night the Kyubi attacked the village."

It was like a hard slap to his face. For a moment his hand drifted to his stomach, where the seal was located.

"Sensei...I'm sorr..."

Kakashi didn't let him finish.

"No Naruto...you did nothing wrong. It's because of you that the Fox was able to be stopped."

Naruto nodded. "The Fourth...why did he pick me?"

Kakashi took a deep breath, as if he were about to let himself fall into a ravine.

"And for that matter, why was his picture at the funeral next to the Thirds when he died so long ago?"

The breath was stuck in his throat, and he had to cough to clear it. "You...you haven't heard?"

"What?"

"Naruto...when Orochimaru trapped the Third and a few others in his barrier, he preformed, well, a summoning of sorts, which called three people from the dead to do his fighting for him."

"That cowar...wait..."

Kakashi nodded. "He called on the First, Second and Fourth Hokage's, raising them from the dead, and made them all slaves to his will. The Fourth managed to break free and was the one who defeated the traitor."

"The Fourth...was there...alive...and fighting that bastard...and I missed it?"

The blond began ranting about how unfair it was that he hadn't been there to see his, and every child's, hero in the flesh. I took Kakashi a minute to get him settled.

"Naruto, do you know what would have happened if you had been there to see him? Hinata, as well as her clansmen, probably would have been killed, not to mention how many others would have died if you hadn't gotten Gaara out of the village."

Naruto looked crest-fallen. "Yeah, I know. I just still wish i could have seen him in action."

"Me too." He placed a hand on the boy's shoulder. "But...He did get to see _you_ in action... from a distance anyway."

Naruto looked up sharply at that. "He...what?"

"You were pretty far away, but it's still hard to miss a fight between three beings of that size."

This statement made Naruto's day. However before he could lose focus on what was going on, Kakashi brought him back to the matter at hand.

"Now, Naruto the thing i brought you here to talk about..."

"Ohh, yea...your sensei..."

"...right..."

Kakashi turned back to the stone, and Naruto was reminded, again of the time he eavesdropped on his sensei.

"... as i was saying; before he died, I made a promise to him...that when you were ready I would give you something..."

Naruto noticed that the man's hand had disappeared into his hip pouch, and he seemed to be getting increasingly nervous.

Kakashi-sensei, what's wrong? Why would your sensei even know anything about me?"

Kakashi met the boy's gaze. "Naruto... he was your... the... one who sealed the Fox into you..."

Kakashi flinched at himself. _'Coward...just tell him__,__ yo__u owe them both that much!__'_

"Whoa...your sensei was the Fourth! Awesome!"

"You didn't know?"

"Nope, how could I? I've never heard him called by his real name before...it was always just...The Fourth."

Kakashi nodded. It was true, of course. Minato had been the greatest Hokage this village had ever known, people referring to him by his title was simply a sign of respect. But it only seemed to make this even harder.

"Well at least that explains why you were telling him i was ok."

The Jonin blinked a few times. "What?"

"I kind of overheard you talking to the stone when you had me meet the pervert here, to fix my seal."

_'oh...that's why he asked about him that night.'_

"Yes, that's part of it anyway...Look Naruto, what I'm about to tell you is something that I've kept from you for way too long...and for that, I'm sorry."

Kakashi took a small wrapped up bundle from his pouch and handed it to the bewildered boy. Who began to unwrap it gently, his hands started trembling.

"...Minato-sensei didn't just choose you to house the Fox..."

The object Naruto held in his hands was a small crimson leather bound book with a spiral stamped on the cover in gold-leaf.

"...he chose you because he knew he could entrust the safety of the village to you..."

Naruto carefully opened the book and looked down on a picture of a blond man standing next to a beautiful woman with red hair. She was sitting on a bed and in her arms she held a small wrapped bundle, also with blond hair and three whisker marks on each cheek.

"...because he was your father..."

The boy's grip on the book grew tighter and now his entire body was shaking.

"...my...he was..."

A single tear rolled down his cheek and fell onto the picture.

For several long moments the two were silent, as Naruto flipped through the pages of the small photo album's various pictures of his father, one with Kakashi's team, a few with the white-haired pervert, and even a few with the Third.

For the most part, however the photo's contained the Fourth...his father...and the red headed woman sharing happy moments with one another.

"This...this is my Mother...?" his voice was low, more a statement than a question.

"Hai...Uzumaki Kushina. You are a lot like her. She loved a good prank, and was always making others smile." The Jonin laughed as he was lost in some far off memory of her, even Naruto smiled. It wasn't much...but it was a connection to her. Something he could think about and say, 'I bet Mom would love this!'

"Uzumaki...Kushina..." Naruto began to scan the monument around where his fathers name was listed.

"She's not there Naruto."

The blonds head whipped around to meet the eyes of his sensei. "Then she's...?" His voice was filled with a sort of desperate hope.

Kakashi hated to crush it.

"We...don't know. On the night of the Kyuubi attack, she was in the hospital, recovering from your birth. Naruto...the entire wing was destroyed...we...never found her body."

"So...there's still a chance she's alive?"

"_*sigh* _Naruto listen...nobody wants to believe that more than I, but it was just so long ago...If she did survive...we would have found her by now."

Naruto's eyes dropped. His hope and heart thoroughly shattered.

"She was loved by a lot of people in this village, so much so that, no one could bear to see her listed among the dead, so in the official records, she is listed as MIA."

For a long time neither of them said a word to one another. Naruto looked again through the album, but kept coming back to the first picture, the one of him with his parents...the only moment they would ever have together.

…...

After wandering around a bit, Naruto headed back to the Hokage's mansion, his mind was still working on overload, trying to sort out today's events. First he had been promoted, and then Kakashi told him about his parents...

He had every Orphan's dream, other than them coming back that is, not only were his parents famous and powerful, but, and most importantly, they hadn't abandoned him. There had been times, in his childhood, when the questions about them had kept him up crying for days on end. And now those questions were put to rest.

He entered the large house, still unsure, and a little uncomfortable about staying there, and threw himself down at the table of the main room, his album sitting in front of him. It was now his most precious possession.

After a while, Kotetsu and Izumo entered the room carrying two boxes and placed them on the table as well.

Naruto eyed them as the two Chunin began sorting through the contents.

"What are those?"

"The Hokage's armor, from the funeral." answered Izumo.

"We need to make sure they are all packed away before being placed back in the vault." his partner finished.

Naruto nodded and was about to go back to the room Konohamaru had insisted he use, when Kotetsu placed a white piece of fabric on the table. It had red markings on the trim.

"Um...is that...?"

Izumo looked at Naruto, and saw where his focus was smiling at the obvious hero-worship.

"Yup...the Fourths Battle Cloak."

Naruto cautiously approached the cloak. It was the same one as in the pictures he had been staring at for the last few hours. His father had worn it personally.

He reached out a hand cautiously, and stopped short of touching it, conscious of who else was in the room.

"Do you think, I could..."

Izumo looked at his partner. They didn't know about Naruto's relationship to the Fourth, and Kakashi had been explicit that he not tell anyone just yet. It would still be far too dangerous.

They had every right to deny him his request. It was in fact, their job to do so.

Kotetsu looked back at the boy and nodded briefly. "Ok, go ahead, but don't get it dirty or damage it, or else it'll be our jobs!"

Naruto hesitated a bit, then with trembling hands he picked up and unfolded the garment. It was very lite, but made from some tough material he couldn't identify.

He knew he shouldn't, but couldn't help himself. Naruto slowly slipped one arm into the cloak's sleeve, followed by the other and as the cloth settled around his shoulders a feeling of safety and warmth enveloped him. And he wondered if this was how it felt to be hugged my ones parent.

A gentle cough from Izumo brought him back to reality. "...oh...sorry...I..."

"Don't worry about it. I don't think I could've resisted any better than you did."

"But, still...do you mind...we aren't the only ones in the house after all." Kotetsu helped Naruto take the cloak off, and the boy noticed that it was still too large for him.

_'...maybe one day...when I've had a chance to grow into it...'_

"Here, would you take this into the Training room for us?" Izumo handed Naruto the box containing the Thirds armor, and with a last look at the cloak as Kotetsu, almost reverently refolded it, did as he was told.

Izumo, after he was out of ear-shot turned to his partner with a strange look. "Did you see that?"

Kotetsu let out a breath he didn't know he was holding. "Yea...he looked just like him..."

…...

As Naruto slid open the training room door, He saw Asuma and Konohamaru kneeling before a large Ape. It was dressed in expensive looking clothing, and had a leaf headband on it's head.

Their business evidently finished, the Ape looked at Naruto with a nod, before vanishing in a puff of smoke.

"BOSS!"

Naruto walked over to them with a smile.

"Is that my father's armor?"

The boy nodded. And as he looked for a place to put it he noticed that an entire wall was filled with armor set on stands in an awe inspiring display. One of the stands was empty and he placed the box in front of it.

"Hey Konohamaru, Asuma-sensei...I just came to drop that off. I don't want to interrupt you so..."

The Jonin smiled. "Nah don't worry about it. We were just going over my fathers will."

Naruto looked saddened by the reminder of the Third's passing. "Oh, I see."

"Actually it's good your here. This was with his will...It's addressed to you."

Asuma held up a letter with Naruto's name printed across the front.

The blonds eyes widened.

_'...the Old Man left me something in his will?...'_

Carefully, Naruto broke the Kage's seal on the back and opened the letter.

_**Naruto,**_

_** I know that some of the most important advice you gotten in your life has been through the use of scrolls and letters...So why should I break with tradition, hmm...**_

_**First...You must know that it has been a great honor for me to have been entrusted with the keeping of your training scrolls, and I know with no doubt in my mind, that you will be the finest Puppet Master the world has ever seen.**_

_**However I must now, at the end, ask you to do something for me. With my passing, my son is all the family that Konohamaru has left. I would ask you to look after him when you are able. I know he looks up to you like and older brother. Knowing this, would bring peace for me.**_

_**Now...after making such a request of you...I must now beg your forgiveness. So much of your past has been kept from you your whole life. Once, when you were a child, you asked me about your parents. It pained me more than you, can know, that I could not answer your questions. And it pains me still, that I cannot do so here. There are many reasons why such information has been kept from you, and I hope you will understand, but I have little doubt that all will soon be revealed. **_

_**However, this much I can say; Your mother once entrusted something to me. Something which she made me promise to give to you when you were ready to have it. Seeing you compete against Kiba in the preliminary rounds proved to me that you were.**_

_**It is hidden in my family's personal vault, which my son has access too. He will know which box to retrieve. I regret that I will not be able to see what use you will put it too.**_

_**Naruto...you more than anyone else in your age group embody the Will of Fire which burns within the hearts of all those who dwell in the Leaf. I am putting all my faith in you to keep the Will burning for all those who will come after...For that is the true role of the Hokage.**_

_**I know you will be a great Hokage one day.**_

_** Sarutobi Hiruzen,**_

_**The Third Hokage of the Village Hidden in the Leaves**_

A silent tear rolled down he cheek as he read the letter again, then handed it to Asuma.

"Oh ok, I think I know which one he meant. I have a meeting of the Jonin to attend, but I'll get it for you right after. You be here?"

Naruto nodded as he looked around the room at the various types of armor. Then a tight grin slowly spread across his face.

"Hey, Sensei...What are you going to do with the Thirds armor?"

…...

A.N.: Oh My God, That was a pain to write. I had so many ideas kicking around in my head for sub plots I was going to go insane. Still I got a few in and I hope they meet with your approval.

Thank you all for the great reviews. Keep sending them, I'll keep writing.

Next Chapter: Naruto begins new duties as Chunin. How will Sasuke react?


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